Book XIII. chap. 12.

[1023] Not having the works of Tudeschi to refer to, I give his remarks as quoted by Villadiego (Fuero Juzgo, p. 177, No. 85) from Gloss. in cap. olim, de cleric. conjug.—“Quod deberet ecclesia facere sicut bonus medicus, ut si medicina, experientia docente, potius officit quam prodit, cam tollat; sic corum voluntati relinqueretur, ita ut sacerdos qui abstinere noluisset, posset uxorem ducere, cum quotidie illicito coitu maculentur.”

[1024] Sacerdotibus magna ratione sublatas nuptias, majori restituendas videri.—Platina in Vit. Pii II.

[1025] Æneæ Sylvii de Concil. Basil. Lib. II.

[1026] De Continentia Sacerdotum, Nürnb. 1510, Prop. 6, 7.

[1027] Trithem. Chron. Hirsaug. ann. 1479.

[1028] Serrarii Hist. Rer. Mogunt. Lib. I. c. 34.

[1029] Fleury, Hist. Eccles. Liv. CXVI. No. 30-38.

[1030] Krasniski, Reformation in Poland, I. 110.

[1031] Gravamina German. Nationis, No. VII.—Remed. contra Gravamina (Freher. et Struv. II. 677-8).

In the previous century some remonstrances against grievances had been uttered, but in a very different tone from this.

[1032] Avisamenta ad Cæsar. Majest. (Ibid. p. 680).

[1033] When Diether was elected Archbishop of Mainz, in 1459, his envoys sent to obtain his confirmation from Pius II. were stupefied with a demand for 20,506 florins—more than double the amount of annates previously assessed on the see. He refused to yield to the demand, but by a little sharp practice between the Apostolic Chamber and the Roman bankers he became entangled, and on his persistent refusal he was prosecuted for the amount, deposed by the pope, and Adolph of Nassau appointed in his place, leading to a bloody war and the devastation of city and territory.—Appell. Dom. Dytheri (Senckenberg. Selecta Juris T. IV. p. 393).—Cf. Helwich de Dissidio Moguntino (Rer. Moguntiac. Script. T. II.). This is probably the fraud alluded to by the Diet of 1510, where it was complained that the annates of the see of Mainz were raised from 10,000 florins to 25,000; and this latter sum was exacted seven times in one generation, resulting in taxation on the peasantry so severe that an insurrection against the clergy was threatened.—Remed. contra Gravam. (Freher. et Struv. II. 678).

In the complaint made to Adrian VI., in 1523, by the Diet of Nürnberg, it is asserted that three generals of the mendicant orders at Rome had purchased the cardinalate with gold wrung from Germany.—Gravam. Nationis German, cap. lxxiii.—_ap._ Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 203.

The general popular opinion of the Roman court is manifested in the Epistolæ Obscurorum Virorum, when speaking of the quarrel between Reuchlin and the theologians, which had been carried before the papal tribunal—“Si Papa est pro theologi, tunc non timeo; etiam audivi ab uno notabili viro, qui est officialis curiæ, qui dixit. Quid nobis hic cum literis? Si Reuchlin habet pecuniam, mittat huc: quia in curia oportet habere pecunias, alias nihil potest expedire.”

That this estimate of the papal curia was shared by the orthodox is shown in the story told of Pierre Danes, Bishop of Vaur, who in 1545 was sent as ambassador by Francis I. to the Council of Trent. In debate a French theologian was inveighing against the corruptions of the Rota, when an Italian ecclesiastic sneeringly cried out, “Gallus cantat.” Danes promptly rejoined, “Utinam illo gallicinio Petrus ad resipiscentiam et fletum excitetur.”—Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. VII. 224.

[1034] The Epist. Obseur. Viror. probably reflects the general sentiment of the conservatives of the time in denouncing Erasmus and the learned wits as heretics. “Quia juvenes volunt se æquiparare senibus, et discipuli magistris, et juristæ theologis, et est magna confusio, et surgunt multi hæretici et pseudochristiani, Iohann. Reuchlin, Erasmus Roterodamus: Bilibaldus nescio quis, et Ulricus Huttenus, Hermannus Buschius, Jacobus Wimphelingus, qui scripsit contra Augustinenses, et Sebastianus Brandt, qui scripsit contra prædicatores, etc.”

So, at a later date, after Luther had arisen, the “Conciliabulum Theologistarum” classes them together “Habeo etiam ego unum spiritum familiarem; illum ego volo mittere ad Lutherum et Erasmum de nocte in lectum, ut eos tribulet et vexet.”

[1035] Erasmi Colloq. Confabulatio Pia.

[1036] Ibid. See also the Encomium Moriæ.—“Nam quid dicam de iis qui sibi fictis scelerum condonationibus suavissime blandiuntur, ac purgatorii spatia veluti clepsydris metiuntur, secula, annos, menses, dies, horas, tanquam e tabula mathematica citra ullum errorem dimentientes?”

[1037] Confabulatio Pia (Colloquia).

[1038] Speaking of the Virgin’s milk and the countless relics of the cross everywhere exposed to the adoration of the pious, he exclaims, “O matrem filio simillimam! ille nobis tantum sanguinis reliquit in terris; hæc tantum lactis quantum vix credibile est esse posse uni mulieri uniparæ, etiamsi nihil bibisset infans.... Idem caussantur de cruce Domini, quæ privatum ac publice tot locis ostenditur, ut si fragmenta conferantur in unum, navis onerariæ justum onus videri possint; et tamen totam crucem suam bajulavit Dominus”—to which he makes a pious interlocutor reply, “Novum fortasse dici possit; mirum nequaquam, quum Dominus, qui hæc auget pro suo arbitrio, sit omnipotens.”—Colloq. Peregrinat. Religionis.

[1039] Supplement. Epist. M. Lutheri, No. II. (Halæ, 1703).

[1040] The popular view of the priesthood is well summed up by Erasmus in the following dialogue: “COCLES, Cur mavis sacerdotium quam uxorem?—PAMPHAGUS, Quia mihi placet otium. Arridet Epicurea vita.—Co. At mea sententia suavius vivunt, quibus est lepida puella domi, quam complectantur, quoties libet.—PAM. Sed adde, nonnunquam quum non libet. Amo voluptatem perpetuam. Qui ducit uxorem, uno mense felix est: cui contingit optimum sacerdotium, in omnem usque vitam fruitur gaudio.—Co. Sed tristis est solitudo, adeo ut nec Adam suaviter victurus fuerit in Paradiso nisi deus illi adjunxisset Evam.—PAM. Non deerit Eva cui sit opulentum sacerdotium,” etc.—Erasmi Colloq. de Captandis Sacerdotiis.

It is, however, perhaps, in the “Encomium Moriæ” that he gives fullest rein to his bitter satire. His own sad experience of conventual life gave him special opportunity of declaiming against the monks “qui se vulgo religiosos ac monachos appellant, utroque falsissimo cognomine, quum et bona pars istorum longissime absit a religione, et nulli magis omnibus locis sint obvii.” Their habit, their observances, their discipline, their ignorance, idleness, vices, are recounted at great length and with the most stinging ridicule, and he makes Folly dismiss them with the contemptuous valediction, “Verum ego istos histriones, tam ingratos beneficiorum meorum dissimulatores quam improbos simulatores pietatis libenter relinquo.” The secular priesthood, the bishops, and even the pope himself, are treated with little more respect, and every class of the ecclesiastical body is stigmatized as endeavoring to thrust upon others the care of the flock and industrious only in shearing the sheep.

The “Encomium Moriæ” had an immediate and immense success. Numberless editions were required to supply the avidity of the learned, and it was immediately translated into almost every language of Europe for the benefit of the unlearned. It appeared in 1509; the Colloquies in 1516.—When these works had produced their result, their dangerous tendencies were discovered, and they enjoyed the honor of being included in the first Index Expurgatorius (App. Concil. Trident). Cardinal Caraffa, indeed, in 1538, had urged upon Paul III. the propriety of excluding the Colloquies from use in schools as a text-book for students.—Concil. de Emend. Eccles. (Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 602).

[1041] The “Epistolæ Obscurorum Virorum” was certainly published before 1516, probably in 1515 (Ebert, Bibliog. Dict. s. v.).—It is equally severe upon the monks—“Tunc ille dixit: ego distinguo de monachis, quia accipiuntur tribus modis. Primo, pro sanctis et utilibus, sed illi sunt in cœlo. Secundo, pro nec utilibus nec inutilibus, et illi sunt picti in ecclesia. Tertio modo pro illis qui adhuc vivunt, et illi multis nocent, etiam non sunt sancti, quia ita superbi sunt sicut unus sæcularium. Et ita libenter habent pecunias et pulchras mulieres,” etc. And again, “Ubi enim diabolus pervenire vel aliquid officere non potest, ibi semper mittit unam malam antiquam vetulam vel unum monachum.”

[1042] De Vanitate Scientiarum cap. lxi., lxii., lxiv.

[1043] Orat. in Comit. Augustan. (Freher. et Struv. II. 702.)

[1044] Bartholini Comment. de Comit. Augustens. ann. 1518 (Senckenberg. Selecta Juris T. IV. pp. 669-70).

[1045] Rymer, Fœdera XIII. 586-7.

[1046] Even in this, Luther was by no means the first. Erasmus had exposed the wickedness of the system with fully as much fervor in the “Encomium Moriæ.”—“Hic mihi puta negotiator aliquis, aut miles, aut judex, abjecto ex tot rapinis unico nummulo, universam vitæ Lernam semel expurgatam putat, totque perjuria, tot libidines, tot ebrietates, tot rixas, tot cædes, tot imposturas, tot perfidias, tot proditiones existimat velut ex pacto redimi, et ita redimi ut jam liceat ad novum scelerum orbem de integro reverti.”—And in the “Epistolæ Obscurorum Vivorum” the falseness of its promises was unflinchingly asserted.

[1047] Ranke, Reformation in Germany, B. II. chap. 3.

[1048] Lutheri Opp. T. I. fol. 335_a_ (Jenæ, 1564).

[1049] Mag. Bull. Roman. Ed. 1692, I. 614.

[1050] De Captiv. Babylon. Eccles. (Lutheri Opp. Jenæ, 1581, II. fol. 283_a_).

[1051] Artic. et Errores Libb. Jur. Canon. No. 18 (Lutheri Opp. Jenæ, 1581, II. fol. 318_a_).

[1052] Ibid. fol. 319_b_.

[1053] Ibid. fol. 362_a_, 374_a_.

[1054] Krasinski, op. cit. I. 112-3.

[1055] Lutheri Opp. Jenæ, 1581, T. II. fol. 438, 440.

[1056] Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1521.

[1057] Lutheri Epistt. Jenæ, 1545, T. II. fol. 38, 39.

[1058] Synod. Vuitemberg. (Lutheri Opp. II. 470).

[1059] Lutheri Opp. II. 477 sqq.—In this edition the tract is dated 1522 in the index and 1521 in the text. Henke and Ranke, however, agree in assigning it to a period subsequent to his return from Wartburg.

[1060] Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1523.—The fact that Spalatin recorded whether he wore the cowl or not, shows the importance which Luther’s friends attached to his example with respect to it.

[1061] Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1522.

[1062] Supplement. Epistt. M. Lutheri No. 31 (Halæ, 1703).

[1063] Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1523.—Thammii Chron. Colditens.—Link married a daughter of Suicer, a lawyer of Oldenburg in Misnia, and the bride’s example was shortly afterwards followed by her two sisters, one of whom was united to Wolfgang Fuess, parish priest of Kolditz, and formerly a monk of Gera; while the other accepted the addresses of the parish priest of Kitscheren. (Spalatin, ubi sup.)

[1064] Spalatin, ubi sup.—How these innovations were regarded in Rome is manifested in a minatory epistle addressed, in 1522, by Adrian II. to the Elector Frederic of Saxony. “Et cum ipse sit apostata ac professionis suæ desertor, ut plurimos sui faciat similes, sancta illa Deo vasa polluere non veretur, consecratasque virgines et vitam monasticam professas extrahere a monasteriis suis, et mundo imo diabolo, quem semel abjuraverunt, reddere ... Christi sacerdotes etiam vilissimis copulat meretricibus etc.” (Hartzheim VI. 192.)

[1065] See the address of Frederic Nausea, surnamed Blancicampianus, afterwards Bishop of Vienna, at the Council of Mainz in 1527.—Synod. Mogunt. ann. 1527 (Hartzheim VI. 207).

[1066] Reformat. Cleri German. ann. 1524 c. 26 (Goldast. Constit. Imp. III. 491).

[1067] Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1524.

[1068] Respons. S. R. I. Ordinum Norim b. cap. 18 (Goldast. op. cit. I. 455).—With this the Legate Cheregato professed himself to be content, but he bitterly complained of an intimation that if these apostate priests and nuns transgressed the laws in any other way, the secular tribunals would punish them. He held that, though apostates, they were still ecclesiastics, only amenable to the courts Christian, and he protested against any violation of the privileges and jurisdiction of the church such as would be committed in bringing them before a civil magistrate. (Ibid. p. 456.)

[1069] Spalatin. ann. 1523.

[1070] Edict. Norimb. Convent, ann. 1523 c. 10, 18, 19 (Goldast. II. 151).—This illustrates well the vacillating conduct of the Council of Regency during this period.

[1071] Chron. Torgaviæ—Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1523. He conveyed them at once to Wittenberg, and Luther writes to Spalatin asking him to collect funds for their support until they can be permanently provided for.

[1072] Spalatin. ubi sup.

[1073] Spalatin. ann. 1524.

[1074] Melanchthon to Camerarius (_ap._ Mayeri Dissert. de Cath. Lutheri conjuge. pp. 25-6).—Melanchthon can only suggest that it was a mysterious act of Providence.—“Isto enim sub negotio fortassi aliquid occulti et quiddam divinius subest, de quo nos curiose quærere non decet.”—The whole letter is singularly apologetic in its tone.

[1075] Spalatin. ann. 1525.

Pomeranius, a priest of Wittenberg, in writing to Spalatin, gives as the reason of Luther’s marriage—“Maligna fama effecit ut Doct. Martinus insperato fieret conjunx;” and Luther, in a letter to the same, admits this even more distinctly—“Os obstruxi infamantibus me cum Catherina Borana.” That his action was not generally approved by his friends is apparent from his asking Michael Stiefel to pray that his new life may sanctify him—“Nam vehementer irritantur sapientes, etiam inter nostros.”—Spalatin. ubi sup.

That surprise should have been aroused is singular, when he had already proclaimed the most extreme views in favor of matrimony. As early as 1522 he delivered his famous “Sermo de Matrimonio,” in which he enjoins it in the strictest manner as a duty incumbent upon all. Thus, in considering the impediments to marriage, he treats of vows, concerning which he says: “Sin votum admissum est, videndum tibi est, ut supra memoravi, num tribus eviratorum generibus comprehendaris, quæ conjugio ademit Deus, ubi te in aliquo istorum uno non repereris, votum rescindas, monasticen deseras oportet; moxque ad naturalem sociam adjungas te matrimonii lege.”—P. I. c. 8 (Opp. Ed. Vuitemberg. V. 121). To this must be added his decided opinions on the subject of conjugal rights, as developed in the well-known passage which has excited so much animadversion, and which, if we are to interpret it literally, conveys a doctrine which sounds so strangely as the precept of a teacher of morality. In treating of the causes of divorce, he remarks: “Tertia ratio est, ubi alter alteri sese subduxerit, ut debitam benevolentiam persolvere nolit, aut habitare cum renuerit. Reperiuntur enim interdum adeo pertinaces uxores, qui etiam si decies in libidinem prolabentur mariti pro sua duritia non curarent. Hic oportunum est ut maritus dicat ‘Si tu nolueris, alia volet.’ Si domina nolit, adveniat ancilla, ita tamen ut antea iterum et tertio uxorem admoneat maritus, et coram aliis ejus etiam pertinaciam detegat, ut publice et ante conspectum ecclesiæ, duritia ejus et agnoscatur et reprehendatur. Si tum renuat, repudia eam, et in vicem Vasti, Ester surroga, Assueri regis exemplo” (Ibid. p. 123).

One conclusion, at least, can safely be drawn from this, that the morality of the age had impressed Luther with the belief that the self-restraint of chastity was impossible.

That the Catholics should make themselves merry over the marriage of the apostate monk and nun was to be expected, and Jerome Emser did not think it beneath him to write an epithalamium on the wedding of his former friend, of which the following may be taken as a specimen—

Ad Priapum Lampsacenum Veneramur, et Silenum Bacchumque cum Venere cum jubilo.

Septa claustri dissipamus, Sacra vasa compilamus Sumptus unde suppetat cum jubilo.

Mayeri Dissert. p. 22, 23.

[1076] Mayeri de Cath. Luth. conjug. Dissert. 4to. Hamburgi, 1702. Cranach, as we have seen, was one of the three witnesses present at the marriage.

[1077] Lutheri Opp. (Jenæ, 1564, T. I. fol. 496-500).

[1078] Supplement Epistt. M. Lutheri No. 212 (Halæ, 1703).

[1079] Avisamentum de Concubinariis non absolvendis, 4to. 1505.—The author devotes a long argument to prove that incontinence in a priest is worse than homicide. His conclusion is “Omnis sacerdos fornicando est sacrilegus et perjurus; et gravius totiens quotiens peccat quam si hominem occidat.”

[1080] Wideman. Chron. Curiæ ann. 1505.

[1081] Neque superiorum tolerantia, seu prava consuetudo, quæ potius corruptela dicenda est, a multitudine peccantium, aliave quælibet excusatio eis aliquo modo suffragetur.—Concil. Lateran. V. ann. 1514 Sess. IX.

[1082] Quia vero in quibusdam regionibus nonnulli jurisdictionem ecclesiasticam habentes, pecuniarios quæstus a concubinariis percipere non erubescunt, patientes eos in tali fœditate sordescere.—Concil. Lateran. V. ann. 1516 Sess. XI.—Cf. Cornel. Agripp. De Vanitate Scient, c. lxiv.—Agrippa even states that it was a common thing for bishops to sell to women whose husbands were absent the right to commit adultery without sin.

[1083] Taxæ Sacræ Pœnitentiariæ, Friedrich’s Ed. p. 38; Gibbings’s, p. 3; Saint-André’s, p. 8.

[1084] Gerardi Noviomagi Philippus Burgundus (Mathæi Analect. I. 230).

[1085] Statut. Synod. Joan. Episc. Ratispon. ann. 1512 (Hartzheim VI. 86).

[1086] Art. 18e “Item. Mais, Nous nous plaignions d’aucuns chanoines qui nous gâtent nôtre bordeau de la ville, car il y en a qui le tiennent en leurs maisons, privément, pour tous venans.”—Quoted from a contemporary MS. by Abraham Ruchat in his “Histoire de la Reformation de la Suisse,” T. I. p. xxxiii.-v. (Genève, 1727). According to Cornelius Agrippa, the Roman prelates derived a regular revenue from this source, the right to keep definite numbers of strumpets in the public brothels being partitioned out between them.—De Vanitate Scient, c. lxiv.

[1087] See, for instance, Novelle, P. III. Nov. lvi.

[1088] Reformat. Cleri German. (Hartzheim VI. 198).—“Hanc perditissimam hæresin ... non parvam habuisse occasionem, partim a perditis moribus et vita clericorum etc.”

There was no scruple in confessing this fact by those who spoke authoritatively for the Catholic church, and it long continued to be alleged as the cause of the stubbornness of the heretics. Thus the Bishop of Constance, in the canons of his Synod of 1567—“Estote etiam memores, damnatam et detestandam cleri vitam huic malo in quo, proh dolor! versamur, majori ex parte ansam præbuisse.... Omnes sapientes peritique viri unanimi sententia hoc asserunt, hocque efflagitant penitus, ut prius clerus ecclesiarumque ministri ac doctores a vitæ sordibus repurgentur, quam ulla cum adversariis nostris de doctrina concordia expectari queat.” And then, after describing in the strongest terms the vices of the clergy and their unwillingness to reform, he adds “Quæ sane morum turpitudo, vehementer et tantopere imperiti populi animos offendit ut subinde magis magisque a catholica nostra religione alienior efficiatur, atque sacerdotium una cum sacerdotibus doctrinam juxta atque doctores, execretur, dirisque devoveat: ita ut protinus ad quamvis sectam deficere potius paratus sit quam quod ad ecclesiam redire velit.”—Synod. Constant. ann. 1567 (Hartzheim VII. 455).

Pius V. himself did not hesitate to adopt the same view. In an epistle addressed to the abbots and priors of the diocese of Freysingen, in 1567, he says—“Cum nobiscum ipsi cogitamus quæ res materiam præbuerit tot tantisque pestiferis hæresibus ... tanti mali causam præcipue fuisse judicamus corruptos prælatorum mores, qui ... eandemque vivendi licentiam iis, quibus præerant permittentes et exemplo eos suo corrumpentes, maximum apud laicos odium contemptionem et invidiam non immerito contraxerunt.” (Hartzheim. VII. 586).

Alfonso de Castro in 1556 declares that the priesthood was one of the efficient causes of the spread of heresy. It would be difficult for orthodoxy to maintain itself without the direct interposition of God, in view of the scandalous lives, and general worthlessness of all orders of ecclesiastics, whose excessive numbers, ignorance, and turpitude exposed them to contempt.—Alph. de Castro de Just. Punit. Hæres. Lib. III. c. 5.

[1089] Reformat. Cleri German, cap. xv.—So when, in 1521, Conrad, Bishop of Wurzburg, issued a mandate for the reformation of his clergy, he described them as for the most part abandoned to gluttony, drunkenness, gambling, quarrelling, and lust.—Mandat. pro. Reformat. Cleri. (Gropp, Script. Rer. Wirceburg. I. 269).—In 1505 the Bishop of Bamberg, in complaining of his clergy, shows us how little respect was habitually paid to the incessant repetition of the canons.—“Condolenter referimus vitam et honestatem clericalem adeo apud quamplures nostrarum civitatis et dioceseos clericos esse obumbratam ut vix inter clericos et laycos discrimen habeatur: et ipsa statuta nostra synodalia in ipsorum clericorum cordibus obliterata et a pluribus non visa aut perlecta vilipendantur: nullam propter nostram, quam hactenus pii pastoris more tolleravimus patientiam, capientes emendationem.”—(Hartzheim VI. 66.)

[1090] Grillandi Tract. de Sortilegiis Quæst. xvii. No. 1.

[1091] Gravamin. Ordin. Imperii cap. xxi., lvii., lxx. (Goldast. I. 464).

When such complaints were made by the highest authority in the empire, it is not difficult to understand the reasons which led the senate of Nürnberg—which city had not yet embraced the Reformation—to deprive, in 1524, the Dominicans and Franciscans of the superintendence and visitation of the nuns of St. Catharine and St.. Clare; nor do we need Spalatin’s malicious suggestion—“cura et visitatione, pene dixeram corruptione.”—Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1524.

[1092] Adriani PP. VI. Instructio data Fr. Cheregato, Nov. 25, 1522 (Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 146).

[1093] Adriani PP. VI. Breve ad Frid. Saxon. (Lutheri Opp. T. II. fol. 542_b_.—Le Plat, II. 134).

[1094] Erasmi Lib. XXXI. Epist. 43.

Notwithstanding the sarcasm, popularly attributed to Erasmus, on the occasion of Luther’s union with Catharine von Bora—that the Reformation had turned out to be a comedy, seeing that it resulted in a marriage—he continued to raise his voice in favor of abolishing the rule of celibacy. Thus he writes, in October, 1525, “Vehementer laudo cœlibatum, sed ut nunc habet sacerdotum ac monachorum vita, præsertim apud Germanos, præstaret indulgeri remedium matrimonii” (Lib. XVIII. Epist. 9). And again, in 1526, “Ego nec sacerdotibus permitto conjugium, nec monachis relaxo vota, ni id fiat ex auctoritate Pontificum, ad ædificationem ecclesiæ non ad destructionem.... In primis optandum esset sacerdotes et monachos castitatem ac cœlestem vitam amplecti. Nunc rebus adeo contaminatis, fortasse levius malum erat eligendum” (Lib. XVIII. Epist. 4).

Yet, in his “Liber de Amabili Ecclesiæ Concordia,” written in 1533 in the hope of reuniting the severed church, while awaiting the promised general council which was to reconcile all things, Erasmus did not hesitate to give utterance to the opinion that those who fell away in heresy or even schism were worse than those who lived impurely in the true faith.

[1095] Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1525.

[1096] Ibid. ann. 1526.

[1097] Henke Append. ad Calixt. p. 595.—Serrarii Rerum Mogunt. Lib. v. (Script. Rer. Mogunt. I. 831, 839). As Albert, though Primate of Germany, was only thirty-five or six years of age, the proposition was not an unreasonable one.

[1098] Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1526.

[1099] Thammii Chron. Coldicens.

[1100] Chron. Waldeccense (Hahnii Collect. Monument. I. 851).

[1101] Confess. Augustanæ P. II. Art. ii., vi.

In his Apology for the Augsburg Confession, however, even the coldness of Melanchthon is warmed in describing the hideous licentiousness caused by the law of celibacy (Lutheri Opp. Jenæ, T. IV. p. 252-3).

[1102] Deliberat. de Concordia etc. c. iii., v. (Goldast. I. 509).

[1103] See Letter of Bergenroth to Romilly, from Simancas, June 14th, 1863 (Cartwright’s Memoir of Bergenroth, London, 1870, p. 124).

[1104] Sentent. Caroli V. § 5 (Ibid. I. 510).—Rescript. Caroli V. § 5 (Ibid. III. 512). Henke, Append. ad Calixt. pp. 595-6.

[1105] Kerssenbroch Bell. Anabaptist. cap. 15, 31.

[1106] How little the situation was comprehended is amusingly shown in a letter from an enlightened and liberal prelate, Johann Schmidt, Bishop of Vienna, to Ferdinand, in 1540, concerning some proposed negotiations then on foot for a reconciliation between the churches. He lays down as a condition precedent to reunion that all the church lands confiscated by the Protestants shall be restored, and the monastic orders reëstablished. The mesne profits, he admits, cannot be collected, but some composition for them should be made.—Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 649.

[1107] An elaborate series of documents relating to these transactions may be found in Goldast. Constit. Imp. I. 511, III. 172-235. Also in Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. Vol. II.

[1108] Artic. Melanch. ad Regem Franciæ, No. X., XI. (Le Plat, op. cit. II. 785-7).

[1109] Lib. ad Rationem Concord. ineundam Art. XXII. § 13 (Goldast. II. 199).

[1110] Respons. Protestant. Art. X. § 3 (Ibid. II. 206). This was still more strongly insisted on in a paper subsequently drawn up by Bucer and presented in the name of the Protestants.—Respons. Protestant. c. 11-14 (Ibid. p. 213).

[1111] Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. III. 152-3.

[1112] Et quanquam cum Apostolo sentiendum eum qui cœlebs est curare quæ sunt Domini etc. (I. Cor. vii.) eoque magis optandum multos inveniri clericos qui cum cœlibes sint vere etiam contineant, tamen quum multi qui ministerii ecclesiastici functiones tenent, jam multis in locis duxerint uxores, quas a se dimittere nolint; super ea re generalis concilii sententia expectetur, cum alioqui mutatio in ea re, ut nunc sunt tempora, sine gravi rerum perturbatione nunc fieri non possit.—Interim cap. XXVI. § 17.

Charles must have entertained the expectation that a change would be authorized by the council of Trent, or prudence would have dictated the policy of not leaving the matter open with the consciousness that the difficulty could only become daily greater by tolerance.

[1113] Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. IV. 19-25.

[1114] Pallavicini, Storia del Concilio di Trento Lib. XII. c. 8. Zaccaria (Nuova Giustificaz. pp. 145, 266), while admitting the fact, states that the original of this document has been sought for in vain; though it had long before been published by Dom Martene (Ampliss. Collect. VIII. 1203). In appointing, however, Jodocus, Bishop of Lubec, as a substitute to exercise their powers, the legates require that priests thus restored shall abandon their wives—a condition not expressed in the original bull (Ibid. p. 1211).

Both from this and from the language of the Interim, it appears that even the Catholic priesthood had begun to arrogate for themselves the right of marriage. That such was the case to a great extent will be seen hereafter.

[1115] Le Plat, T. IV. p. 27.

[1116] Recess. ann. 1551 c. 10 (Goldast. II. 341).

[1117] Transac. Pataviens. Artic. de Relig. (Ibid. I. 573).

[1118] Ibid. I. 574.

[1119] Vision of Piers Ploughman, Wright’s ed., pp. 300, 303.

[1120] Ibid. p. 325.—According to David Buchanan, Langlande was also author of a tract “Pro conjugio sacerdotum.” (Ibid. Introduction, p. x.)

[1121] In a sermon before the Convocation of 1512, Colet is very severe upon the vices of the church—“we are troubled in these days by heretics—men mad with strange folly—but this heresy of theirs is not so pestilential and pernicious to us and the people as the vicious and depraved lives of the clergy”—and he urges the prelates to revive the ancient canons, the enforcement of which would purify the church. (Seebohm’s Oxford Reformers of 1498, p. 170. London, 1867.)

The title of this work seems to me a misnomer. Neither Colet nor Erasmus had the aggressive spirit of martyrdom which was essential to the character of a reformer in those fierce times. They could deplore existing evils, but lacked all practical boldness in applying remedies, and their influence is only to be traced in the minds which they unwittingly trained to do work which they themselves abhorred.

[1122] Thus, in his Epigrams, he ridicules the bishops as a class:—

“Tam male cantasti possis ut episcopus esse, Tam bene legisti, ut non tamen esse queas. Non satis esse putet, si quis vitabit utrumvis, Sed fieri si vis præsul, utrumque cave.”

T. Mori Opp. p. 249. Francofurti, 1689.

And he addresses a parish priest:—

“Quid faciant fugiantve tui, quo cernere possint, Vita potest claro pro speculo esse tua. Tantum opus admonitu est, ut te intueantur, et ut tu Quæ facis, hæc fugiant: quæ fugis, hæc faciant.”

Ibid. p. 247.

See also his epigrams “In Posthumum Episcopum,” “In Episcopum illiteratum,” “De Nautis ejicientibus Monachum,” etc.

[1123] Responsio ad Lutherum, _passim_: “Pater, frater, potator Lutherus,” seems to be a favorite expression, but is mild in comparison with others—“novum inferorum Deum,” “Satanista Lutherus,” “pediculoso fraterculo.” Luther’s friends are “nebulonum, potatorum, scortatorum, sicariorum, senatum,” and More winds up his theological argument with—“furiosum fraterculum et latrinarium nebulonem cum suis furiis et furoribus, cum suis merdis et stercoribus cacantem cacatumque relinquere.”

Luther was himself a master in theological abuse, but More’s admiring biographer, Stapleton, boasts that the German was appalled at the superior vigor of the Englishman, and for the first time in his life he declined further controversy—“magis mutus factus est quam piscis.” (Stapletoni Vit. T. Mori cap. iv.) As More, however, published the tract under the name of “William Rosse, an Englishman who had recently died in Rome, Luther’s reticence is more easily to be accounted for”.

[1124] In one passage More describes his Utopians as considering virtue to consist in living according to nature. “Nempe virtutem definiunt, secundum naturam vivere: ad id siquidem a Deo institutos esse nos.... Vitam ergo jucundam, inquiunt, id est voluptatem, tanquam operationum omnium finem, ipsa nobis natura præscribit: ex cujus præscripto vivere, virtutem definiunt” (Utopiæ Lib. II. Tit. de Peregrinatione). In another passage, however, he describes two sects or heresies, the one consisting of men who abstained from marriage and the use of flesh, the other of those who devoted themselves to labor, marrying as a duty and indulging in food to increase their strength, and says of them “Hos Utopiani prudentiores, at illos sanctiores reputant” (Ibid. Tit. de Religionibus).

[1125] Respons. ad Lutherum Perorat.

It should be borne in mind that this was written after his friend Erasmus had publicly given in his adhesion to marriage as the only remedy for sacerdotal corruption.

[1126] Ibid. Lib. I. cap. iv.

[1127] Froude’s England, Ch. x.

[1128] Wilkins III. 669, 678.

[1129] Card. Eboracens. Epist. v. (Martene Ampliss. Collect. III. 1289).

[1130] Strype’s Eccles. Memorials, T. I. App. p. 19.

[1131] Strype’s Memorials of Cranmer, Bk. II. ch. v.

[1132] Rymer’s Fœdera, XIV. 15.

[1133] Wilkins III. 704.—Bishop Burnet says that Wolsey’s design in procuring this Bull was to suppress all monasteries, but that he was persuaded to abandon his purpose on account of opposition and dread of scandals.—Hist. Reform. Vol. I. p. 20 (Ed. 1679).

[1134] Rymer, XIV. 24.—Confirmed by the king, January 7, 1525 (Ibid. p. 32).

[1135] Ibid. pp. 156-6, 172-5.

[1136] Ibid. pp. 240-44, 250-58. See a letter of the English ambassadors at Rome to Wolsey, describing a conference on this subject with the Pope, wherein he freely acknowledged the propriety of destroying those houses which were nothing but a “Scandalum religionis.”—Strype, Eccles. Memorials, I. App. 58.

[1137] Rymer, XIV. pp. 270-1.

[1138] Rymer, XIV. 272-3.

[1139] Ibid. 273-5.

[1140] Ibid. 291-3.

[1141] Ibid. 345-6. A document showing one phase of the struggle may be found in Strype’s Memorials I. Append. p. 89. It is to the credit of Wolsey that he retained his interest in his colleges even after his fall. See his letter to Gardiner of July 23rd, 1530 (Ibid. p. 92).

[1142] Pecock’s Records of the Reformation No. 276 (Vol. II. p. 259).

[1143] Wilkins III. 755-62.

[1144] Ibid. 770-82, 789.—Parliamentary Hist. of England, I. 525. In 1532 Henry had complained to his Parliament that the clergy were but half subjects to him, in consequence of their oaths to the pope, and he desired that some remedy should be found for this state of things (Ibid. p. 519).

[1145] Strype, Eccles. Memor. I. 195.

[1146] Suppression of Monasteries, p. 40 (Camden Soc.).—Strype, op. cit. p. 197.

[1147] Strype, op. cit. pp. 277-8.

[1148] Burnet I. 182.

[1149] Wilkins III. 787.

[1150] Suppression of Monasteries, p. 175.

[1151] Hist. Reform. I. 190-1.

[1152] Le Plat V. 244-5.

[1153] Suppression of Monasteries, p. 112.

[1154] Eccles. Memorials, I. 256-7.

[1155] Suppression of Monasteries, Nos. xvii., xxi., xxiv., xlii., xlv., xlvii., xcviii., &c.

[1156] Ibid. No. cxx.

[1157] Travels of Nicander Nucius, pp. 68-71 (Camden Soc.).

[1158] Strype, Eccles. Memor. I. 249.

[1159] As published in the Harleian Miscellany, the Beggars’ Petition bears the date of 1538, but internal evidence would assign it to a time anterior to the suppression of the monasteries, and Burnet attributes it to the period under consideration, saying that it was written by Simon Fish, of Gray’s Inn, that it took mightily with the public, and that when it was handed to the king by Ann Boleyn, “he lik’d it well, and would not suffer anything to be done to the author” (Hist. Reform. I. 160). Froude, indeed, assigns it to the date of 1528, and states that Wolsey issued a proclamation against it, and further, that Simon Fish, the author, died in 1528 (Hist. Engl. Ch. VI.), while Strype (Eccles. Memorials1. 165) includes it in a list of books prohibited by Cuthbert, Bishop of London, in 1526. In the edition of 1546, the date of 1524 is attributed to it.

The tone of that which was thus equally agreeable to the court and to the city, may be judged from the following extracts, which are by no means the plainest spoken that might be selected.

“§ 13. Yea, and what do they more? Truly, nothing but apply themselves by all the sleights they may to have to do with every man’s wife, every man’s daughter, and every man’s maid; that cuckoldry should reign over all among your subjects; that no man should know his own child; that their bastards might inherit the possessions of every man, to put the right-begotten children clean beside their inheritance, in subversion of all estates and godly order.

Ҥ 16. Who is she that will set her hands to work to get three-pence a day, and may have at least twenty-pence a day to sleep an hour with a friar, a monk, or a priest? Who is he that would labour for a groat a day, and may have at least twelve-pence a day to be a bawd to a priest, a monk, or a friar?

“§ 31. Wherefore, if your grace will set their sturdy loobies abroad in the world, to get them wives of their own, to get their living with their labour, in the sweat of their faces, according to the commandment of God, _Gen._ iii., to give other idle people, by their example, occasion to go to labour; tye these holy, idle thieves to the carts to be whipped naked about every market-town, till they will fall to labour, that they may, by their importunate begging, not take away the alms that the good Christian people would give unto us sore, impotent, miserable people your bedemen.”

[1160] Articles devised by the Kinges Highnes Majestie, ann. 1536 (Formularies of Faith, Oxford, 1856 p. xxxi.).

[1161] Burnet I. 193-4, 222-4;—Parl. Hist. I. 526-7. To our modern notions, there is something inexpressibly disgusting in the openness with which bribes were tendered to Cromwell by those who were eager to obtain grants of abbey lands (Suppression of Monasteries, _passim_). On the other hand, the abbots and abbesses who feared for their houses had as little scruple in offering him large sums for his protection. Thus the good Bishop Latimer renders himself the intermediary (Dec. 16th, 1536) of an offer from the Prior of Great Malvern of 500 marks to the king and 200 to Cromwell to preserve that foundation; while the Abbot, of Peterboro’ tendered the enormous sum of 2500 marks to the king and £300 to Cromwell (Ibid. 150, 179). The liberal disposition of the latter seems to have made an impression, for, though he could not save his abbey, he was appointed the first Bishop of Peterboro’—a see erected upon the ruins of the house.

[1162] “They be very pore, and can have lytyll serves withowtt ther capacytes. The bischoyppys and curettes be very hard to them, withowtt they have ther capacytes.”—The Bishop of Dover to Cromwell, March 10th, 1538 (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 193). These “capacities” empowered them to perform the functions of secular priests. The good bishop pleads that certain poor monks may obtain them without paying the usual fee.

[1163] 27 Henry VIII. c. 25, renewed by 28 Hen. VIII. c. 6.—Parliament. Hist. I. 574.

[1164] Burnet I. 227-34; Collect. 160.—Wilkins III. 784, 792, 812.—Rymer XIV. 549.

[1165] 28 Henry VIII. c. 10.—Parl. Hist. I. 533.

[1166] Burnet I. 235-7. These pensions were not in all cases secured without difficulty, even after promises had been made and agreements entered into (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 126).

[1167] Suppression of Monasteries, p. 170.—Strype’s Eccles. Memor. I. 262.

[1168] Strype, Memorials of Cranmer, Book I. Chap. ix.

[1169] Suppression of Monast. pp. 194, 203.

[1170] A letter from John Bartelot to Cromwell shows that the abbot purchased secrecy by distributing thirty pounds to those who detected him, and promising them thirty more. This latter sum was subsequently reduced to six pounds, for which the holy man gave his note. This not being paid at maturity, he was sued, when he had the audacity to complain to Cromwell, and to threaten to prosecute the intruders for robbery and force them to return the money paid. Bartelot relates his share in the somewhat questionable transaction with great naïveté, and applies to Cromwell for protection.—Suppression of Monasteries, Letter xxv.

[1171] This may have been true, for Dr. London was one of the miserable tools who are the fitting representatives of the time. His desire to discover the irregularities of the monastic orders arose from no reverence for virtue, for he underwent public penance at Oxford for adultery with a mother and daughter (Strype, Eccles. Memor. I. 376); and his zeal in suppressing the monasteries was complemented with equal zeal in persecuting Protestants. In 1543 he made himself conspicuous, in conjunction with Gardiner, by having heretics burned under the provisions of the Six Articles. His eagerness in this good work led him to commit perjury, on conviction of which he was pilloried in Windsor, Reading, and Newbury, and thrust into the Fleet, where he died.—Strype, Memorials of Cranmer, Book I. Chap. 26, 27.

In fact, Henry’s capricious despotism rendered it almost impossible that he could be served by men of self-respect and honor.

[1172] Burnet I. 238-43.—See also Froude’s Hist. Engl. III. 285 et seq. During his visitation (Aug. 27th, 1538), the Bishop of Dover writes to Cromwell, “I have Malkow’s ere that Peter stroke of, as yt ys wrytyn, and a M. as trewe as that” (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 212). In a report of Dec. 28th, 1538, Dr. London observes, with dry humor, “I have dyvers other propre thinges, as two heddes of seynt Ursula, wich bycause ther ys no maner of sylver abowt them, I reserve tyll I have another hedd of herse, wich I schall fynd in my waye within theese xiiii. days, as I am creadably informyd” (Ibid. p. 234). Dr. Leighton writes in the same spirit to Cromwell—“Yee shall also receive a Bag of Relicks wherein ye shall see Stranger Things as shall appear by the Scripture. As God’s Coat, or Ladie’s Smock; Part of God’s Supper, In cœna Domini; Pars petræ super qua natus erat Jesus in Bethlehem. Besides there is in Bethlehem plenty of Stones and sometimes Quarries, and maketh their mangers of Stone. The scripture of every thing shall declare you all. And all these of Mayden Bradley. Where is a holy Father Prior; and hath but six Sons and one Daughter married yet of the goods of the Monastery. And he thanketh God, he never meddled with married women; but all with Maidens, the fairest could be gotten. And always married them right well. The Pope, considering his fragility, gave him license to keep a w——: and hath good writing, sub Plumbo, to discharge his conscience” (Strype, Eccles. Memor. I. 253).—Nicander Nucius (op. cit. pp. 51-62) relates some of the stories current at the time of the miracles engineered by the monks to stave off their impending doom.

[1173] Parl. Hist. I. 535.

[1174] 31 Henry VIII. c. 13 (Parl. Hist. I. 537).

[1175] 32 Hen. VIII. c. 24 (Ibid. 543-44).

[1176] Burnet I. 262-3.

[1177] Rymer XIV., XV.

[1178] 37 Hen. VIII. c. 4 (Parl. Hist. I. 561).

[1179] Parl. Hist. I. 537. Such hospitals, chantries, &c., as were spared by Henry VIII. were speedily swept away, as soon as Edward VI. succeeded to the throne, by the act 1 Edw. VI. c. 14 (Parl. Hist. I. 583).

[1180] This may readily be considered no exaggeration. A letter from John Freeman to Cromwell values at £80,000 the lead alone stripped from the dismantled houses (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 290).

[1181] Such is the substance of a memorandum in Henry’s own hand-writing (Suppression of Monasteries, No. 131, p. 263).

[1182] 31 Hen. VIII. c. 9 (Parl. Hist. I. 540).

[1183] Burnet I. 300.

[1184] Strype, Eccles. Memor. I. 345.

[1185] See letters of the Lord Chancellor Audley and the learned Sir Thomas Elyot to Cromwell.—Strype, Eccles. Memor. I. 263-5.

[1186] Op. cit. I. 392-403; II. 258-63.

[1187] 5-6 Edw. VI. c. 2 (Parl. Hist. I. 596).

[1188] 1 Edw. VI. c. 3.—Parl. Hist. I. 583.—Burnet II. 45. In 1538 the Bishop of Dover interceded with Cromwell for licenses to enable some ejected friars to abandon their monastic gowns, “For off trewthe ther harttes be clene from the relygyon the more parte, so they myght change ther cotes, the whyche they be not abull to paye for, for they have no thenge” (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 197).

[1189] Fœdera, T. XIV. p. 551.

[1190] Froude, Hist. Engl. IV. 543.

[1191] Thus “An Exposition into the sevenith Chapitre of the firste Epistle to the Corinthians” seems to have been almost entirely devoted to an argument against celibacy, adducing all manner of reasons derived from nature, morality, necessity, and Scripture, and describing forcibly the evils arising from the rule. The author does not hesitate to declare that “Matrimony is as golde, the spirituall estates as dung,” and the tenor of his writings may be understood from his triumphant exclamation, after insisting that all the Apostles and their immediate successors were married—“Seeing that ye chose not married men to bishoppes, other Criste must be a foole or unrighteous which so did chose, or you anticristis and deceyvers.”

The “Sum of Scripture” was more moderate in its expressions. “Yf a man vowe to lyve chaste and in povertie in a monasterie, than yf he perceyve that in the monastery he lyveth woorse than he did before, as in fornication and theft, then he may leve the cloyster and breke his vowe without synne.”

Tyndale in “The Obedience of a Cristen Man” is most uncompromising. “Oportet presbyterem ducere uxorem duas ob causas.” ... “If thou bind thy self to chastitie to obteyn that which Criste purchesed for the, surely soo art thow an infidele.”

The “Revelation of Anticriste” carries the war into the enemy’s territory in a fashion somewhat savage. “Keping of virginitie and chastite of religion is a devellishe thinge” (Wilkins III. 728-34).

[1192] Strype, Memorials of Cranmer, Book III. Chapter 34.

[1193] For instances of these practices, see Froude’s England, Ch. III.

[1194] Wilkins III. 778.—Strype, in his “Memorials of Cranmer,” Bk. I. Chap. 18, gives this proclamation as dated Nov. 16, in the 30th year of Henry VIII. which would place it in 1538, and Bishop Wilkins also prints (III. 696) from Harmer’s “Specimen of Errors” the same with unimportant variations, as “given this 16th day of November, in the 13th year of our reign,” which would place it in 1521. It is impossible, however, at a time when even the Lutherans of Saxony had scarcely ventured on the innovation, that in England priestly marriage could already have become as common as the proclamation shows it to be. The bull of Leo X., thanking Henry for his refutation of Luther, was dated Nov. 4th, 1521, and we may be sure that the king’s zeal for the faith would at such a moment have prompted him to much more stringent measures of repression, if he had ventured, at that epoch, to invade the sacred precincts of ecclesiastical jurisdiction—a thing he would have been by no means likely to do. The date of 1521 is therefore evidently an error.

For the same reasons I have been forced to reject a discussion in convocation of the same year (Wilkins III. 697), in which the question of sacerdotal marriage was decided triumphantly in the affirmative. The proceedings are evidently those of Dec. 1547, in the first year of Edward VI.

[1195] Burnet’s Collections I. 319.

[1196] MS. State Paper Office (Froude, III. 65). Ap Rice’s report to Cromwell is sufficiently suggestive as to the interior life of the monastic orders to deserve transcription. “As we were of late at Walden, the abbot there being a man of good learning and right sincere judgment, as I examined him alone, showed me secretly, upon stipulation of silence, but only unto you as our judge, that he had contracted matrimony with a certain woman secretly, having present thereat but one trusty witness; because he, not being able, as he said, to contain, though he could not be suffered by the laws of man, saw he might do it lawfully by the laws of God; and for the avoiding of more inconvenience, which before he was provoked unto, he did thus, having confidence in you that this act should not be anything prejudicial unto him.”

[1197] MS. State Paper Office (Froude, III. 372). It is not to be assumed, however, that the clergy were worse than the laity. During the visitation of the monasteries, Thomas Leigh, one of the visitors, says, in writing to Cromwell, Aug. 22, 1536, concerning the region between Coventry and Chester “For certain of the knights and gentlemen, and most commonly all, liveth so incontinently, having their concubines openly in their houses, with five or six of their children, and putting from them their wives, that all the country therewith be not a little offended, and taketh evil example of them” (Miscellaneous State Papers, London, 1778, I. 21). It perhaps would not be easy to determine the exact responsibility of the clergy for this immorality of their flocks.

[1198] Strype, Eccles. Memorials, Vol. I. Append. p. 176.

[1199] Burnet’s Collect. I. 362.

[1200] Formularies of Faith, Oxford, 1856.—Wilkins III. 826.

[1201] Suppression of Monasteries, pp. 160-1.

[1202] He made one exception. Nuns professed before the age of 21 were at liberty to marry after the dissolution of their houses, whereat, according to Dr. London, they “be wonderfull gladde ... and do pray right hartely for the kinges majestie” (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 214).

[1203] Strype’s Eccles. Memor. I. 320.

[1204] Burnet I. 254-55; Collect. 332, 347.

[1205] “Nothing has yet been settled concerning the marriage of the clergy, although some persons have very freely preached before the king upon the subject.”—John Butler to Conrad Pellican (Froude III. 381).

[1206] Burnet, Collect. I. 329.

[1207] Strype’s Eccles. Memor. I. 339, 343.

[1208] Strype’s Eccles. Memor. I. 344.—Wilkins III. 847.

[1209] Yet the moderate party ventured to submit to parliament “A Device for extirpating Heresies among the People,” among the suggestions of which was a bill for abolishing ecclesiastical celibacy, legalizing all existing marriages, and permitting the clergy in general “to have wives and work for their living”—Rolls House MS. (Froude III. 381).

[1210] Burnet I. 258-9.—31 Henry VIII. c. xiv. Mr. Froude endeavors to relieve Henry of the responsibility of this measure, and quotes Melanchthon to show that its cruelty is attributable to Gardiner (Hist. Engl. III. 395). He admits, however, that the bill as passed differs but slightly from that presented by the king himself, with whom the committee which framed it must have acted in concert. According to Strype, “The Parliament men said little against this bill, but seemed all unanimous for it; neither did the Lord Chancellor Audley, no, nor the Lord Privy Seal, Cromwel, speak against it: the reason being, no question, because they saw the king so resolved upon it.... Nay, at the very same time it passed, he (Cranmer) stayed and protested against it, though the king desired him to go out, since he could not consent to it. Worcester (Latimer) also, as well as Sarum (Shaxton), was committed to prison; and he, as well as the other, resigned up his bishopric upon the act”—(Memorials of Cranmer, Book I. Chap. 19). This shows us how the royal influence was used. Cranmer, indeed, in his reply to the Devonshire rebels, when in 1549 they demanded the restoration of the Six Articles, expressly asserts “that if the king’s majesty himself had not come personally into the Parliament house, those lawes had never passed” (Ibid. App. No. XL.).

[1211] 31 Henry VIII. c. 6 (Parl. Hist. I. 536-40).

[1212] Parl. Hist. I. 540.

There is a story current that soon after the passage of the Act, the Duke of Norfolk, who had had so much to do with it, on meeting a former chaplain of his named Lawney, jocularly said to him “O, my Lawney (knowing him of old much to favor priests’ matrimony), whether may priests now have wives or no?” “If it please your grace,” replied he, “I cannot well tell whether priests may have wives or no; but well I wot, and am sure of it, for all your act, that wives will have priests.”—Strvpe’s Memorials of Cranmer, Book I. Chap. viii.

[1213] Dr. London chronicles the troubles of this class. “I perceyve many of the other sortt, monkes and chanons, whiche be yonge lustie men, allways fatt fedde, lyving in ydelnes and at rest, be sore perplexide that now being prestes they may nott retorn and marye” (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 215).

Nicander Nucius asserts that many did marry openly—“ἂλλους δδὲ γυναῖκας ἐννόμως συνεύνους εἰσαγομένους” (Op. cit. p. 71).

[1214] His first marriage was entered into while he was still quite young, and before he had taken orders. The second, however, shows that he acted with some independence, for it took place in 1531, before Henry’s open rupture with Rome, and while he was ambassador to the Emperor. At that time he was King’s chaplain and archdeacon of Taunton, and his nuptials therefore were plainly an indication of heresy.—Strype’s Memorials of Cranmer, Book I. Chap. iii., Book III. Chap. xxvii.

[1215] Burnet I. 256-7. It was not until 1543 that he ventured to confess this to the king (Ibid. p. 328). At his trial in 1556 his two marriages were one of the points of accusation against him (Ibid. II. 339).

Sanders, in commenting upon Cranmer’s time-serving disposition, which enabled him to accommodate himself to Henry’s capricious opinions, and yet to enter fully into the reformatory ideas predominant under Edward VI., does not fail to satirize his connubial propensities. “Unum illud molestissime tamen ferens, quod meretricem quandam suam non poterat palam uxoris loco libere habere, quia id non laturum Henricum sciebat, sed partim domi eam occultare, partim cum foras prodiret, cista quadam ad id affabre facta inclusam, secum una circumferre cogeretur. Iste ergo jam desiit esse Henricianus, et tam ex immatura regis Edouardi ætate quam ex Protectoris in sectas summa propensione, suæ statim simul et libidini et hæresi habenas laxandas statuit; nam et scorto suo mox est publice pro uxore usus, et catechismum Edouardo dedicatum, falsæ impiæque doctrinæ plenum, in lucem edidit.”—De Orig. et Prog. Schismatis Anglicani, p. 193 (Ed. 1586).

[1216] Melanchthon. Epist. Ed. 1565 p. 34.

[1217] 2-3 Edw. VI. c. 21 (Parl. Hist. I. 586).

[1218] 32 Hen. VIII. c. 10.—Burnet I. 282.—Parl. Hist. I. 575.

Richard Hilles, writing in 1541 to Henry Bullinger, assumes that this modification of the Six Articles only applied to those who were guilty of incontinence, and that it did not “appear to the king at all extreme still to hang those clergymen who marry or who retain those wives whom they had married previous to the former statute” (Original Letters, Parker Soc. Pub. p. 205)—but both Burnet and the Parliamentary History make no such distinction, and in the abstract of the bill as printed in the Statutes at Large (I. 281) it is described as applicable to “priests married or unmarried.”

[1219] [see transcriber’s notes] Hooper to Bullinger.—Original Letters, Parker Soc. Pub. p. 36.

[1220] Thus Dr. Parker, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, was married on June 24th, 1547, within six months after Henry’s death, to Margaret, daughter of Robert Harlston of Mattishall. As he had been in priest’s orders since 1527, he assumed a liberty which was not even asked of Parliament until nearly eighteen months later (see his autobiographical memoranda in his Correspondence, pp. vii., x., Parker Soc., 1853).

[1221] 1 Edw. I. c. I, 12 (Parl. Hist. I. 582-4).—Wilkins IV. 16.—Burnet, II. 40, 41; III. 189.

[1222] 2-3 Edw. VI. c. 21 (Parl. Hist. I. 586).—Burnet II. 88-9.

[1223] Wilkins IV. 26.—Cardwell’s Documentary Annals, I. 59. Wilkins and Cardwell date this in 1547, which is evidently impossible. Burnet (II. 102) alludes to it under 1549, which is much more likely to be correct.

[1224] Sanderi Schisma Anglic. pp. 214-5.

[1225] Strype, Memorials of Cranmer, Bk. II. chap. 14.—Smith subsequently at Louvain continued to urge the necessity of celibacy and was answered by Peter Martyr. Strype calls him a filthy fellow, notorious for lewdness, and his championship of chastity excited some merriment. There is an epigram upon him by Lawrence Humphrey—

“Haud satis affabre tractans fabrilia Smithus Librum de vita cœlibe composuit Dumque pudicitiam, dum vota monastica laudat, Stuprat, sacra notans fœdera conjugii.”

(Ibid. Chap. 25.)

[1226] The vast growth of the sheep-farms had long been a subject of complaint. Even as early as 1516, Sir Thomas More describes with indignant energy the misery caused by the ejectment of the agricultural population in order to form enormous sheep-walks, which were found more profitable to the landlords than ordinary farming. He declares that the sheep “tam edaces atque indomitæ esse cœperunt, ut homines devorent ipsos, agros, domos, oppida vastent ac depopulentur.”—Utopia, Lib. I.

[1227] Burnet II. 117-9.

[1228] Strype’s Eccles. Memorials, II. 420.

[1229] Burnet II. Collect. 217. In the Latin version, “ Episcopis, presbyteris et diaconis non est mandatum ut cœlibatum voveant; neque, jure divino coguntur matrimonio abstinere” (Wilkins IV. 76).

[1230] Strype’s Eccles. Memorials, II. 355.

[1231] Ibid. p. 445.—“Our curate is naught, an Assehead, a Dodipot, a Lack-Latine, and can do nothing.”

[1232] 5-6 Edw. VI. c. 12 (Parl. Hist. I. 594).—Burnet II. 192.

It is curious to observe that the modern “Ritualistic” portion of the English clergy adopt the same line of argument from the marriage service of the Anglican ritual, and apply it not only to the priesthood but to the whole body of believers. See “The Church and the World,” edited by the Rev. Orby Shipley, 2d edition, 1866, p. 161.

[1233] Reform. Legg. Eecles. Tit. de Hæresibus. cap. xx. (Cardwell’s Ed., Oxford, 1850, p. 20).—Cf. Tit. de Matrimonio c. ix. (p. 44).

[1234] Strype’s Eccles. Memor. III. 20. This story derives additional piquancy from the fact that this Dr. Weston was somewhat notorious for uncleanness and was subsequently deprived of the Deanery of Windsor for adultery (Ibid. pp. 111-2).

[1235] 1 Mary c. 2 (Parl. Hist. I. 609-10).—Burnet II. 255.

[1236] Strype’s Eccles. Memorials, III. 52.

[1237] Burnet II. Append. 264. According to Strype, Bonner’s impatience did not wait for the royal injunctions, for in February he deprived of their livings all the married priests in his diocese of London and commanded them to bring all their wives within a fortnight in order that they might be divorced.—Memorials of Cranmer, Bk. III. chap. 8.

Julius III. issued a Bull, March 8th, 1554, defining Cardinal Pole’s legatine powers, among which was that of removing the excommunication from married clerks and legitimating their children, the fathers being removed from function and benefice, separated from their wives, and subjected to penance (Cardwell’s Documentary Annals, I. 131). This was the course adopted for a time, but as the kingdom was not yet formally reconciled to Rome, the action had was under the local authorities.

[1238] Strype’s Eccles. Memor. III. Append. 33.—In the same place (p. 31) may be found a copy of the summons served upon offenders of this class.

[1239] Burnet II. 275 and Append. 256.—Rymer (T. XV. pp. 376-77) gives a similar commission dated March 9th, issued to Stephen Gardiner to eject the canons and prebendaries of Westminster in the same summary manner. The proceedings throughout England were doubtless framed on these models.

[1240] Burnet II. Append. 260.

[1241] Bishop Poynette wrote a book entitled “An Apologie on the Godly Marriadge of Priestes,” in rejoinder to Martin’s “Traictise declaryng and plainly prouyng that the pretensed marriage of priestes and professed persones is no marriage,” which was a reply to Poynette’s previous work. Bale also issued a bitter attack on Bonner’s Articles (Cardwell’s Documentary Annals, I. 135) and Dr. Parker, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, published a voluminous rejoinder to Martin.

[1242] Wilkins IV. 96-7.

[1243] Burnet II. 276; III. 225-6.

[1244] A specimen of the form of restitution subscribed by those who were restored on profession of amendment and repentance has been preserved—“Whereas ... I the said Robert do now lament and bewail my life past, and the offence by me committed; intending firmly by God’s grace hereafter to lead a pure, chast, and continent life ... and do here before my competent judge and ordinary most humbly require absolution of and from all such censures and pains of the laws as by my said offence and ungodly behavior I have incurred and deserved: promising firmly ... never to return to the said Agnes Staunton as to my wife or concubine, &c.”—(Wilkins IV. 104).

[1245] Strype’s Memorials of Cranmer, Bk. III. chap. 8.—Nov. 14th, 1554, we find a record of four priests doing penance in white shirts and holding candles at Paul’s Cross, London, while Harpsfield preached a sermon.—Strype’s Eccles. Memor. III. 203.

[1246] Parl. Hist. I. 616.

[1247] The Bull is dated December 24, 1554 (Wilkins IV. 111).—Parliament repealed the attainder of Cardinal Pole, November 22d, and on the 24th he arrived in London as legate (Burnet II. 261-2).

[1248] 1 and 2 Phil. and Mary c. 8 (Parl. Hist. I. 624). The title of the bill shows that, though the Parliament was almost exclusively Catholic, it was disposed to make its obedience to Rome the price for obtaining confirmation of the abbey lands—“A Bill for repealing all statutes, articles, and provisoes made against the See Apostolique of Rome, since the 20th of Henry VIII., and for the establishment of all spiritual and ecclesiastical possessions and hereditaments conveyed to the laity.”

[1249] 2 and 3 Phil. and Mary, c. 4 (Parl. Hist. pp. 626-8).

[1250] Mag. Bull. Roman. T. I. p. 809.

[1251] Original Letters, Parker Soc. Pub. p. 149.

[1252] Parl. Hist. I. 626; II. 342.

[1253] Card. Poli Constit. Legat. Decret. V. (Wilkins IV. 800).

[1254] Strype’s Parker, Book II. chap. vi. In 1561 the remains were exhumed from the stables of Dr. Marshall, the previous dean of Christ’s Church, and reburied in the church, the precaution being taken of mingling them with the bones of St. Frideswide, so as to prevent any future profanation in case of another revolution of religion. The affair excited considerable attention at the time, and produced the following epigram:

Femineum sexum Romani semper amarunt: Projiciunt corpus cur muliebre foras? Hoc si tu quæras, facilis responsio danda est: Corpora non curant mortua, viva petunt.

[1255] “That none of those priests that were, under the pretence of lawfull matrimony, married, and now reconciled, do privilie resorte to their pretensed wives, or suffer the same to resorte unto them. And that those priests do in no wise henceforth withdrawe themselves from the mynisterie and office of priesthodde under the paine of the lawes”—Pole’s Injunctions in Diocese of Gloucester (Wilkins IV. 146).

[1256] Wilkins IV. 157. Thus in the visitation of the diocese of Lincoln, the vicar of Spaldwick was presented for scandalizing his flock by carrying in his arms his child by a wife from whom he had been separated. At the same time a priest of Caisho named Nix was subjected to penance for consorting with his former wife, but was permitted to resume his functions—Strype’s Eccles. Memor. III. 293.

[1257] Strype’s Eccles. Memor. III. 111-12.

[1258] Wilkins IV. 169.

[1259] 1 Eliz. c. 1, 2, 4 (Parl. Hist. I. 646-76).

[1260] Burnet, II. 386-95.

[1261] Parker’s Correspondence, p. 66.—Sanders does not fail to make the most of this refusal to legalize priestly marriage by act of Parliament, and of the hesitation which rendered the final decision a mere toleration and not an approval. “Clerus enim in Anglia novus, partim ex apostatis nostris, partim ex hominibus mere laicis factus, ut est valde spiritualis, primo quoque tempore de nuptiis cogitabat; multumque sategit, ut conjugia Episcoporum Canonicorum et cæterorum ministorum legibus approbarentur; sed obtineri non potuit, quia vel turpe videbatur ministerio, vel reipublicæ perniciosum. Edovardus quidem sextus omnes canonicas et humanas prohibitiones circa clericorum aut etiam religiosorum connubia lege comitiali seu parlamentaria sustulerat; eam legem mox abrogavit Maria, nunc restituendam ac renovandam clamitant isti, sed non exaudiuntur: omnes tamen per totum fere regnum quia de dono [castitatis] (ut loquuntur) non sunt certi, non secundum leges, sed secundum indulgentiam; vel (ut illi dicunt) secundum scripturas, sed ad libidinem suam compositas, ineunt prima, secunda, vel etiam tertia conjugia, contra canones et morem non solum Latinorum sed etiam Græcorum; et prole ita abundant, ut ad illam sustentandam opibusque augendam, et populus supra modum gravetur, et ipsi misere beneficia sua expilent.”—De Schismate Anglicano, Lib. III. (Ingoldstatii, 1586, p. 299).

[1262] Strype’s Annals, I. 81.

[1263] Royal Injunctions of 1559, Art. XXIX. “Although there be no prohibition by the word of God, nor any example of the primitive church, but that the priests and ministers of the church may lawfully, for the avoiding of fornication, have an honest and sober wife, and that for the same purpose the same was by act of Parliament in the time of our dear brother King Edward the Sixth made lawful, whereupon a great number of the clergy of this realm were married and so continue; yet, because there hath grown offence and some slander to the church, by lack of discreet and sober behavior in many ministers of the church, both in chusing of their wives and undiscreet living with them, the remedy whereof is necessary to be sought; it is thought therefore very necessary that no manner of priest or deacon shall hereafter take to his wife any manner of woman without the advice and allowance first had upon good examination by the bishop of the same diocese and two justices of the peace of the same shire dwelling next to the place where the same woman hath made her most abode before her marriage; nor without the goodwill of the parents of the said woman if she have any living, or two of the next of her kinsfolks, or for lack of the knowledge of such, of her master or mistress where she serveth. And before she shall be contracted in any place, he shall make a good and certain proof thereof to the minister or to the congregation assembled for that purpose, which shall be upon some holy-day where divers may be present. And if any shall do otherwise, that then they shall not be permitted to minister either the word or the sacraments of the church, nor shall be capable of any ecclesiastical benefice. And for the marriages of any bishops, the same shall be allowed and approved by the metropolitan of the province and also by such commissioners as the Queen’s Majesty thereunto shall appoint. And if any master or dean or any head of any college shall purpose to marry, the same shall not be allowed but by such to whom the visitation of the same doth properly belong, who shall in any wise provide that the same turn not to the hindrance of their house”—(Wilkins IV. 186).

See also a letter of Theodore Beza, Zurich Letters, p. 247 (Parker Soc. Publications).

[1264] Cardwell’s Documentary Annals, I. 309.

[1265] Strype’s Parker, Book II. chap. v.—In 1569 the returns for the Archdeaconry of Canterbury show 135 married clergymen to 34 licensed preachers, and there is no mention of any unmarried men (Ib. III. xxiv.).

[1266] In the English version, as given by Burnet (Vol. II. Append. 217), there are 42 articles, of which this is the 31st. In the Latin edition (Wilkins IV. 236), there are but 39 articles, this being the 32d, which is the arrangement according to the standard of the Anglican church.

[1267] Wilkins IV. 189-91.—This commission was the commencement of the Court of High Commission, which played so lamentable a part in the troubles of the succeeding reigns. The result of its visitation in 1559 shows how little real conviction existed among the clergy who had been exposed to the capricious persecutions of alternating rulers. Out of 9400 beneficiaries in England under Mary, but 14 bishops, 6 abbots, 12 deans, 12 archdeacons, 15 heads of colleges, 50 prebendaries, and 80 rectors of parishes had abandoned their preferment on account of Protestantism (Burnet Vol. II. Append. 217), and of these it is fair to assume that the higher dignitaries at least had not been allowed to retain their positions.

[1268] Wilkins IV. 253.—Strype’s Parker, App. liii.

[1269] In 1576 she declared to Grindal, then Archbishop of Canterbury, “that it was good for the church to have few preachers, and that three or four might suffice for a county; and that the reading of the Homilies to the people was enough.”—Strype’s Life of Grindal, p. 221.—See also Strype’s Parker, Book II. chap. xx.

[1270] Strickland, Life of Queen Elizabeth, Chap. IV.

[1271] Strype’s Annals, I. 364-5.

[1272] Parker’s Correspondence, pp. 146-8.

[1273] Ibid. p. 152.

[1274] Parker’s Correspondence, pp. 156-8.

[1275] Wilkins IV. 269.

[1276] Parker’s Correspondence, p. 259.

[1277] Qui autem istis darent filias suas, ne protestantes quidem fere inveniebantur, nedum Catholici: primum quia existimant id esse per se infame, ut sint vel dicantur uxores presbyterorum. Secundo, quia juxta leges regni non sunt adhuc vera sed adulterina conjugia, ac proinde proles illegitima. Tertio quia non accrescit his uxoribus aut liberis suis ex maritorum loco aut honore in Republica ulla dignitas aut existimatio, quod est contra naturam veri matrimonii. Non enim Archiepiscopus, Episcopus, aliusve hodie prælatus in Anglia si sit conjugatus, tribuit quicquam ex eo honoris vel præeminentia uxori suæ, non magis quam si esset ejus tantum concubina. Hinc sit ut nec eas Elizabetha in aulam, nec principum uxores in consortium ullo modo admittant, ne Archiepiscoporum quidem vocatas conjuges; sed debent eas mariti domi continere, pro vasis tantem libidinis aut necessitatis suæ. Quæ istis ergo conditionibus, vel summis prælatis conjungerentur, cum honestiores paucæ aut nullæ reperiebantur, quas poterant habere accipere fuit necesse. Sed et aliis modis utcumque istorum hominum cupiditati per magistratum civilem impositum est frænum. Nam et Collegiorum alumni qui in Anglicanis universitatibus admodum multi erant, otioque ac saturitate panis abundabant, ac admodum provecti ætate erant, cupiebant et ipsi habere uxores; sed videbatur inconveniens, et id privilegii Collegiorum tantum Rectoribus concessum est, cum hac tamen exceptione, ut conjuges seorsim plerunque extra Collegia constituant, rariusque eas intromittant.—De Schismate Anglicano Lib. III. (Ingoldstat. 1586, p. 300).

See also Florimund. Raemund. Histor. Memoral. Lib. VI. cap. xii.

Of course much allowance must be made for the statements of so keen a partisan as Sanders, and one who had suffered so much from those whom he satirized, yet he was a man of too much shrewdness to make statements which his contemporaries could recognize as entirely destitute of foundation.

Even to this day the position of the wives of the Anglican prelates is made a subject of ridicule by Catholic polemics. A recent Italian tract entitled “Il Celibato del sacerdozio Cattolico” remarks “Osservate piuttosto le mogli de’ vescovi e degli arcivescovi Anglicani, tenute esse in conto di concubine non hanno posto alcuno nella civile società.”—Panzini, Confessione di un Prigioniero, p. 472.

[1278] Zurich Letters, Second Series, p. 359 (Parker Society, 1845). Wiburn was deprived for non-conformity in 1564, so that this must have been written subsequently (Strype’s Life of Grindal, p. 98).

[1279] Zurich Letters, First Series, pp. 164, 179.

[1280] “That, concerning Virginity and the Single Life, he handled the case so finely that to his thinking, if he should have believed him, he could not find three good Virgins since Christ’s time. And that so he left the Matter with an Exhortation to all to Mary, Mary. Further, That he said in that Sermon that single-living Men, that is to say unmaried, and especially unmaried priests, lived naught. And that there in that City were lately presented five or six unmaried priests that kept five or six whores apiece; though there were not above four unmaried priests in the City in all.”—Strype’s Annals, I. 349.

[1281] “Where he alledgeth that he never called Priests Wives _Whores_, it is untrue. For three Women going through his Park, wherein is a path for footmen, he supposing they had been Priests Wives called unto them, _Ye shall not come through my Park and no such Priests Whores_.”—Ibid. p. 358.

[1282] See a tract published against the rebels, attributed by Strype to Sir Thomas Smith, which ridicules the advocates of celibacy with a vigor reminding us of the Beggars’ Petition.—“This is a quarrel wholly like the old Rebels Complaint of Enclosing of Commons. Many of your _Disordered and evil disposed_ Wives are much agrieved that Priests, which were wont to be Common be now made Several. _Hinc illæ lachrymæ._ There is Grief indeed, and Truth it is, and so shall you find it. Few Women storm against the marriage of priests, calling it unlawful and incensing Men against it, but such as have been Priests Harlots or fain would be. Content your Wives yourselves and let Priests have their own.”—Strype’s Annals, I. 558.

[1283] A causidico, medicastro, ipsaque artificum farragine, ecclesiæ rector aut vicarius contemnitur et fit ludibrio. Gentis et familiæ nitor sacris ordinibus pollutus censetur: fœminisque natalitio insignibus unicum inculcatur sæpius præceptum, ne modestiæ naufragium faciant, aut (quod idem auribus tam delicatulis sonat) ne clerico se nuptas dari patiantur.—T. Wood, Angliæ Notitia (Macaulay’s Hist. Engl. Chap. III.).

Lord Macaulay attributes the degraded position of the clergy to their indigence and want of influence. These causes doubtless had their effect, but the peculiar repugnance towards clerical marriage ascribed to all respectable women had a deeper origin than simply the beggarly stipends attached to the majority of English livings.

[1284] Rahlenbeck, L’Église de Liége, p. 49. The stern and self-centred soul which won for Idelette the hand of Calvin was unshaken to the last, as may be seen by his curious account of her death-bed, in a letter to Farel (Calvini Epistolæ, p. 111. Genevæ, 1617). His grief was doubtless sincere, but his friends were able to compliment him on his not allowing domestic affliction to interfere with his customary routine of labor (Ibid. p. 116).

[1285] I have not access to the original, but quote the following from Quick’s “Synodicon in Gallia Reformata,” London, 1692—“Art. XXIV..... We do also reject those means which men presumed they had, whereby they might be redeemed before God; for they derogate from the satisfaction of the Death and Passion of Jesus Christ. Finally, We hold Purgatory to be none other than a cheat, which came out of the same shop: from which also proceeded monastical vows, pilgrimages, prohibition of marriage and the use of meats, a ceremonious observation of days, auricular confession, indulgences, and all other such matters, by which Grace and Salvation may be supposed to be deserved. Which things we reject, not only for the false opinion of merit which was affixed to them, but also because they are the inventions of men, and are a yoke laid by their sole authority upon conscience” (Quick I. xi.).—See also the Confession written by Calvin in 1562, to be laid before the Emperor Ferdinand (Calvini Epist. pp. 564-66).

[1286] Discip. Chap. XIII. can. xxviii. (Quick, I. liii.).

[1287] Ibid. Chap. I. can. xlvii.

[1288] Chap. IV. Art. xii., Chap. XVI. Art. xiv. (Quick, I. 32, 38).

[1289] Prelates of high position were not wanting to the list of married men. Carracioli, Bishop of Troyes, and Spifame, Bishop of Nevers, were of the number. Jean de Monluc, Bishop of Valence (brother of the celebrated Marshal Blaise de Monluc, whose cruelties to the Huguenots were so notorious), married without openly apostatizing, and died in the Catholic faith. Cardinal Odet de Châtillon, Bishop of Beauvais, and brother of the Admiral, became a declared Calvinist, married Mdlle. de Hauteville, and called himself Comte de Beauvais. He seems to have retained his benefices, and was still called by the Catholics M. le Cardinal, “Car il nous estoit fort à cœur,” says Brantôme (Discours 48), “de luy changer le nom qui luy avoit esté si bien seant.”

[1290] Édit de Roussillon, Art. 7 (Isambert, Anciennes Lois Françaises, XV. 172). This edict was cited in the proceedings of the case of Dumonteil, about the year 1830, of which more hereafter.

[1291] Édit de 1576, Art. 9.—Édit de Poitiers, Art. Secrets, No. 8 (Isambert, T. XV. pp. 283, 331).

[1292] Concil. Rotomag. ann. 1581 cap. de Monasteriis § 32 (Harduin. X. 1253).

[1293] Édit de Nantes, Art. Secrets, No. 39 (Isambert, T. XVI. p. 206).

[1294] Grégoire, Hist, du Mariage des Prêtres en France, pp. 58-9.

[1295] A decision rendered on the argument of the distinguished avocat général Omer Talon expressly states “que la prohibition du mariage des personnes constituées dans les ordres etant une loi de l’État aussi bien que de l’Église, un prêtre malgré sa profession de Calvinisme, était demeuré sujet aux lois de l’État, et dès lors n’avait pas pu valablement contracter mariage.”—Bouhier de l’Écluse, de l’État des Prêtres en France, Paris, 1842, p. 12.

[1296] Knox, History of the Reformation in Scotland, p. 3 (Ed. 1609).

[1297] Knox, pp. 15-16.—Calderwood’s Historie of the Kirk of Scotland, I. 83-5 (Wodrow Soc.).

[1298] Knox, pp. 16-17.

[1299] Buchanan. Rer. Scot. Hist. Lib. xv.—Robertson, Hist of Scot. B. II.—Knox, 71-2.—Calderwood I. 222.

[1300] Buchanan. Lib. xv.

[1301] Wilkins IV. 207.

[1302] Concil. Edinburgens. ann. 1549 can. 1, 2 (Wilkins IV. 48).

[1303] Wilkins IV. 207-10.—Knox, p. 129. It should be borne in mind in estimating these penalties that they are expressed in pounds Scots, which were about one-twelfth of the pound sterling. These canons, it appears, were not adopted without opposition. According to Knox, “But herefrom appealed the Bishop of Murray and other prelates, saying That they would abide the canon law. And so they might well enough do, so long as they remained Interpretors, Dispensators, Makers and Disannullers of the law ” (Op. cit. 119). It was doubtless on some such considerations that the Archbishop of St. Andrews relied when he consented to waive his exemption in this matter. His personal reputation may be estimated from the remark of Queen Mary when, in December, 1566, he performed the rite of baptism on James VI. She forbade him to use the popular ceremony of employing his saliva, giving a reason which was in the highest degree derogatory to his moral character (Sir J. Y. Simpson, in Proceedings of Epidemiological Society of London, Nov. 5th, 1860).

[1304] Robertson, Hist. Scot. Bk. II.

[1305] Thus the Parliament of 1560, which effected a settlement of the Reformed Religion, was urged to its duty by a Supplication presented in the name of “The Barons, Gentlemen, Burgesses, and other true Subjects of this Realm, professing the Lord Jesus within the same,” which, among its arguments against Catholicism, does not hesitate to assert—“Secondarily, seeing that the sacraments of Jesus Christ are most shamefully abused and profaned by that Romane Harlot and her sworne vassals, and also because that the true Discipline of the Ancient Church is utterly now among that Sect extinguished: For who within the Realme are more corrupt in life and manners than are they that are called the Clergie, living in whoredom and adultery, deflouring Virgins, corrupting Matrons, and doing all abomination without fear of punishment. We humbly, therefore, desire your Honors to finde remedy against the one and the other”—Knox, p. 255.

[1306] This doctrine bore its full share in the history of the Scottish reformation. Two years after the execution of the protomartyr, Patrick Hamilton, in 1528, his sister Catharine was arraigned on account of her belief in justification through Christ. Learned divines urged upon her with prolix earnestness of disputation the necessity of works, until her patience gave way, and she rudely exclaimed, “Work here and work there, what kind of working is all this? No work can save me but the work of Christ my Saviour.” By the connivance of the king she was enabled to escape to England.—Calderwood’s Historie, I. 109.

[1307] Knox, p. 283.

[1308] Knox, p. 119.—Calderwood, I. 423.

[1309] Thus the assembly of the church in 1562 drew up a remonstrance to the queen, in which they requested that “in every Parish some of the Tythes may be assigned to the sustentation and maintenance of the poor within the same: And likewise that some publike relief may be provided for the poor within Burroughs”—Knox, p. 339.

[1310] Ibid. p. 278. The Book was signed at Edinburgh, Jan. 27, 1561, but only after the adoption of a proviso—“Provided that the Bishops, Abbots, Priors and other Prelates and Beneficed men, which else have adjoyned themselves to us, brooke the revenues of their Benefices during their lifetimes.”—Worldly wisdom certainly was not lost sight of in the ardor of a new and purer religion.

[1311] Knox, 136.

[1312] Calderwood’s Historie, I. 123-4.

[1313] Knox, p. 65.—Knox’s characteristic comment on this is—“When he had said these words, they were all dumb, thinking it better to have ten concubines than one wife.”

[1314] Calderwood I. 231 sqq.

[1315] Knox, p. 130.—Calderwood I. 337 sqq.—Burnet vol. II. The implacable character of Scottish persecution is aptly illustrated by a proclamation issued by Cardinal Beatoun in 1540 for the purpose of spiting Sir Ralph Sadler, the English envoy at Edinburgh. It was during Lent, and the proclamation declared “that whosoever should buy an egg or eat an egg within those dioceses should forfeit no less than his body to be burnt as a heretic, and all his goods confiscate to the king”—Froude, Hist. Engl. IV. 54.

It was a life and death struggle, in which quarter could neither be asked nor given.

[1316] Knox, p. 263.

[1317] Ibid. p. 304.

[1318] Strype’s Parker, Book II. ch. xviii.

[1319] The orator of the council of Cologne in 1527 sharply reminded the assembled prelates that they must set the example of obeying their own statutes, and that they could not expect the people to reverence the true church so long as it notoriously bade defiance to the laws of God and man. “Quasi præscribatur lex cujus sancitor voluerit esse exlex. Parendum enim est legi quam quisque sancit.... Audis præterea non licere plurimas habere uxores, quæ animum tuum alliciant; non decere domi alere tot scorta tot Veneres, quæ te continue exedunt, tuamque substantiam disperdunt.... His et aliis datur scandalum populo; præbetur offendiculum vulgo, cui hac tempestate vilet et contemptui est ordo quilibet sacer. Vilis plebs te sacerdotem nunc cachinnis atque ludibriis incessit et odit, qui calumniandi ansam ultro præbueris. Dicit namque: tot hic, aut ille, scorta domi suæ ex patrimonio Crucifixi nutrit, quo non sordida scorta, sed pauperes Christi forent sustentandi”—Concil. Colon. ann. 1527 (Hartzheim VI. 210-213).

So at the council of Augsburg, in 1548, the orator dwelt upon the advantage which the heretics derived from the sins of the clergy—“Non estis nescii, quemadmodum nos hæretici apud populum perpetuo traducant: nos scortatores, nos ambitiosos, nos avaros, nos ignavos, et rudes esse, nos otio semper, luxui et ventri servire, identidem vociferantur.... Superbe itaque illi: sed utinam non nimium sæpe vere: nam si vera potius hoc loco, quam plausibilia, dicenda sint; negare certe non possumus, quin maximam ad nos accusandos occasionem sæpe dederimus”—Concil. Augustan. ann. 1548 (Hartzheim VI. 388).

[1320] Concil. Parisiens. ann. 1521 (Martene Ampl. Coll. VIII. 1018).

[1321] Quisquis igitur contra sacrorum conciliorum et patrum decreta, sacerdotes, diaconos aut subdiaconos lege cœlibatus non teneri docuerit aut liberas illis concesserit nuptias, inter hæreticos, omni tergiversatione rejecta numeretur.—Concil. Paris. ann. 1528, Decret. 8.

This, I think, is the first authoritative promulgation of Damiani’s doctrine, which, as we shall hereafter see, was adopted and extended by the council of Trent.

[1322] Ibid. can. 3, 27.

[1323] Pierre de la Place, Estat de Rel. et Rep. Liv. III.

[1324] Concil. Narbonnens. ann. 1551 can. 22 (Harduin. X. 468).

[1325] Consilium de Emend. Eccles. (Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 598).

[1326] Bull, ad Canonum (Mag. Bull. Roman. Ed. 1692, I. 682).

Alexander III., in prohibiting the sons of priests from enjoying their fathers’ benefices, had permitted it if a third party intervened, and a dispensation for the irregularity were obtained. The letter of this law was frequently observed, but its spirit eluded by nominally passing the preferment through the hands of a man of straw, and it was this abuse which Clement desired to eradicate.

[1327] Consilium de Emend. Eccles. (Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 599).

[1328] Wilkins IV. 209.

[1329] Le Plat, V. 88. The opinion which was held of the venality of the Roman Court in such matters is forcibly expressed in the instructions given to Lanssac, the French ambassador at Trent. He is ordered to press the abolition of the Papal power of dispensation “attendu que nul n’en est refusé s’il a argent.”—Ibid. p. 153.

[1330] Ejus sanctitati lex non sit præscribenda.—Ibid. p. 385.

[1331] Tax. Sac. Pœnitent. Ed. Gibbings, p. 13.—This was only one carlino (the tenth part of a ducat, equal to about fourpence), more than the charge for the bastard of a layman.

[1332] In 1526 or 1527, the authorities of Seville endeavored to regulate this by forbidding certain articles of dress to concubines, whether of ecclesiastics or laymen.—Wahu, Le Pope et la Société Moderne, Paris, 1879 p. 395.

[1333] Ribadeneira Vit. Ignat. Loyol. Lib. II. cap. v.

Ribadeneira was one of Loyola’s early disciples, and is therefore good authority. His description would show that permanent unions were formed, respected by the people but not recognized by the church, in the same manner as those alluded to by Bishop Pelayo, two centuries earlier.

[1334] Diaz de Luco, Practica Criminalis Canonica cap. lxxiii. (Venetiis, 1543).

[1335] Concil. Coloniens. ann. 1536, P. II. c. 28. Six years later, in 1542, Bishop Hermann embraced Lutheranism, married, and in 1546 was driven from his see and retired to his county of Wied, where he died some years afterwards, at the ripe age of 80 years.

[1336] Concil. Salisburg. XLI. (Dalham, Concil. Salisburgens. pp. 296-322).

[1337] Acta Concil. Trident. (Martene Ampl. Coll. VIII. 1063-9).

[1338] Sarpi, Istor. del Concilio Trident. Lib. VI. (Ed. Helmstad. II. 140).—Cf. Le Plat, V. 337-8.

[1339] Le Plat, V. 235.

[1340] Charles was careful to put on record his ceaseless endeavors with Clement and Paul to obtain the convocation of a council and the numberless promises made to him, for the evasion of which reasons were always found.—Commentaires de Charles-Quint, pp. 96-7 (Paris, 1862).

[1341] Select. Harl. Miscell., London, 1793, p. 137.

[1342] The temper with which the Protestants now viewed the council is well expressed in a letter from Aonio Paleario written in 1542 or 1545, from Rome to Luther, Melanchthon, Bucer, and Calvin, urging them by no means to sanction the assembly with their presence—(Published by Illgen, 4to. Leipzig, 1833).

[1343] There is something very amusingly suggestive in the guarded manner in which Charles alludes to the translation of the Council—“O ditto Papa Paulo por respeitos, que o moveram (os quaes Deus permitta que forsem bons) tratton de avocar e transferir a Bolonha”—(Commentaires, p. 98).

[1344] That the complaints of the Protestants were well founded, is evident from the secret instructions given, Feb. 20th, 1552, by Julius III. to the Bishop of Monte Fiascone, when sending him as legate to Charles V. He was to explain to the emperor that the Council would not discuss the propositions of the heretics “nimirum quod judex non respondet parti, ne ex judice se partem constituat;” and he is further to explain that “petentes commune concilium hæretici et schismatici repellendi sunt a onciliis universalibus ... nullo modo commmunicandum esse concilium cum hæreticis et schismaticis, qui sunt extra ecclesiam ... sed bene possunt admitti, ut possint interesse pro convincendis etiam pluries eorum erroribus.”—Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. T. IV. p. 534-5.

[1345] The feeling entertained by Pius towards the council is shown by his remark, in Dec. 1561, to M. de Lisle, the French ambassador, that it had been called simply for the benefit of France—“dautant que ledit concile, qui est de peu de besoin pour le reste de la chrestienté, superflu aux Catholiques et non desiré des papes” (Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. IV. 742).

[1346] The characteristic correspondence is in Le Plat, IV. 678-87.

[1347] Charles declares that at the commencement of his pontificate Paul was earnestly desirous of reforming the abuses of the church, but that his zeal rapidly diminished and he followed the example of Clement in contenting himself with empty promises.—“Com tudo despois com o tempo aquellas mostras e ardor primeiro se foi esfriando, e seguindo os passos e exemplo do Papa Clemente, com boas palavras prolongon e entretene sempre a convoçáō e ajuntamento do concilio” (Commentaires, p. 97).

[1348] Per serrar la bocca agl’ heretici i quali non facevano altro in voce et in scritto che dir male della corte di Roma.—Carraciolo, Vita di Paolo IV. MS. Br. Mus. (Young, Life and Times of Aonio Paleario, I. 261).

[1349] Concilium de Emendanda Ecclesia (Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 601, 602).

[1350] It has been customarily stated by Catholic writers that this proceeding of Paul IV. was directed not against his own work, but against the heretically commentated editions, but this, I believe, has been refuted by Schelhorn. See Gibbings’s “Taxes of the Penitentiary,” p. xlix.

[1351] Published by Clausen, Copenhagen, 1829.

[1352] Lib. ad Ration. Concord. ineundam Art. XXII. § 13 (Goldast. II. 199).

[1353] Formul. Reformat, cap. XVII. § 4 (Goldast. II. 335).

[1354] Ibid. cap. III. § 1, cap. V. § § 7, 9.

[1355] Synod. Augustan. ann. 1548 c. 10.

[1356] Synod. Trevirens. ann. 1548.

[1357] Synod. Trevirens. ann. 1548 cap. ii.

[1358] Synod. Trevirens. II. ann. 1549 cap. xi., xix.

[1359] Mandat. de abjic. Concub. (Hartzheim VI. 353).

[1360] Ibid. p. 358. A Diocesan Synod was also held at Liége, Nov. 15, which gave offending clerks fifteen days to part with their concubines (Ibid. VI. 395).

[1361] Concil. Coloniens. ann. 1549 cap. Quibus possint.—Cap. de Monach. conjugat.—Cap. de Concub. Monach.—Cap. Comœdias.

[1362] Hartzheim VI. 767, 781.

[1363] Dalham, Concil. Salisburg. pp. 328, 337 (Concil. Salisburg. XLIV. can. vii.).

[1364] Gropp, Collect. Script. Wirceburg. I. 311.—Hartzheim VI. 359, 417. In the epistle convoking his council, Bishop Melchior of Wurzburg alluded passionately to the evils everywhere existing: “Videtis percussum pastorem; videtis oves dispersas; videtis impudentem peccandi licentiam; videtis adversus pietatem audaciam tum loquendi tum disputandi impiissimam, et indies scelerata gliscere schismata” (Ibid. X. 753).

[1365] Concil. Mogunt. ann. 1549 c. 82, 102.

[1366] Synod. Camerac. ann. 1550 (Hartzheim VI. 654).

[1367] Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. IV. 611.

[1368] Consult. Imp. Ferdinand. (Le Plat, V. 235). It would be impossible to conceive a darker picture of clerical life than is given in this document. “Ejici autem nunc clerum, conculcari pedibus, pro nihilo haberi et tanquam publicum offendiculum devoveri diris aut paulo plus, tam verum est quam minime falsum, cleri mores insulsos esse, vanos esse, turpes esse, æque ecclesiæ perniciosos ac Deo execrabiles”—Ibid. p. 237.

[1369] Krasinski, Reformation in Poland, I. 190, 285.

[1370] Hosii Dialogus de ea, num Calicem Laicis et Uxores Sacerdotibus permitti etc. Dilingæ, 1558.

[1371] Pallavicini, Storia del Concil. di Trento, Lib. XIV. c. 13.

Twelve years before, his uncle, the Bishop of Liége, in promulgating the Augsburg formula of reformation, had made a similar assertion—“Preterquam quod hoc infœlici sæculo, quo omnis caro corrupit viam suam, præsertimque ordo clericorum et ecclesiasticorum, nimium degenerant, plus quam unquam est necessaria”—Concil. Leodiens. ann. 1548 (Hartzheim VI. 392). The increased emphasis of Ferdinand is a measure of the success which had attended the reformatory movements of Charles V. during the interval.

In such a condition of ecclesiastical morality it is no wonder that even in orthodox Vienna the most popular theme on which preachers could expatiate was the corruption of the church.—See the Emperor Ferdinand’s secret instructions to his envoy in Rome, March 6th, 1560, in Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. IV. 622.

[1372] Pallavicini, loc. cit. That the Catholic church of Germany had become widely infected with this Lutheran heresy is also shown by the fact that in 1548 the Archbishop of Cologne had found it necessary to prohibit throughout his province all marriages of priests, monks, and nuns, and had pronounced illegitimate the offspring of such unions.—Hartzheim VI. 357.

[1373] Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. IV. 644.

[1374] Pallavicini, Lib. XV. c. 5.—The duke, though no bigot, was a good Catholic.

[1375] Pallavicini, Lib. XVII. c. 4. At the request of Duke Albert, the question was also mooted at the provincial synod of Salzburg, held in 1562 for the purpose of sending delegates to Trent.—Hartzheim VII. 230.

[1376] Articuli de Reform. Eccles. No. 14, 15, 18.—Goldast. II. 376.

[1377] Consultat. Imp. Ferdinandi (Le Plat, V. 249, 252).

[1378] Considerat. Cæsar. Majest. sup. Matrim. Sacerd. Nos. 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17 (Goldast. II. 382-3—Le Plat, VI. 315).

[1379] Le Plat, V. 154, 208, 211.

[1380] Le Plat, V. 562-3.

[1381] Capi dati da’ Francesi cap. 1—(Baluz. et Mansi IV. 374) Comp. Zaccaria pp. 133-4.

[1382] Votum castitatis sacris ordinibus conjunctum, atque vota quæ in probatis religionibus emittuntur, et alia quæcunque rite suscepta, fideliter sunt observanda.—Le Plat, IV. 649.

[1383] Ibid. IV. 756, 760, 761, 765.—The 182 articles which, according to Archbishop Bartholomew, required reform in the internal discipline of the church form as damaging a commentary upon its condition as any of the attacks of the Protestants.

[1384] Art. v.—Lettere del Arcivesc. Calini (Baluz. et Mansi IV. 295).—Le Plat, V. 674.

[1385] Lettere di Calini (Ibid. 326).

[1386] See the apologetic letter of the nuncio to the emperor, Jan. 19th, 1562 (Le Plat, op. cit. V. 320). Ferdinand remonstrated earnestly, but did not venture to rebel against their decision (Ibid. 351-60).

[1387] Ibid. p. 388.

[1388] Lettere del Nunzio Visconti (Baluz. et Mansi III. 453).

[1389] Disputat. Joann, de Ludegna (Harduin. X. 359). The learned doctor presents his argument in the form of a colloquy between himself and Calvin, and its spirit may be gathered from the first speech of Calvin, in which he is made to declare that he is endeavoring to find arguments with which to defend himself and his apostate strumpets.

[1390] Sarpi, Lib. VII. (Opere, II. 280, Helmstat, 1761).

[1391] Sarpi (loc. cit.).

[1392] Pallavicini, Lib. XVII. c. 4.

[1393] Sarpi, Lib. VIII. p. 315.

[1394] Concil. Trident. Sess. XXIV. De Sacrament. Matrimon.

Can. IX. Si quis dixerit clericos in sacris ordinibus constitutos, vel regulares castitatem solemniter professos, posse matrimonium contrahere, contractumque validum esse, non obstante lege ecclesiastica vel voto; et oppositum nihil aliud esse quam damnare matrimonium; posseque omnes contrahere matrimonium, qui non sentiunt se castitatis, etiamsi eam voverint, habere donum; anathema sit; quum Deus id recte petentibus non deneget, nec patiatur nos supra id quod possumus tentari.

Can. X. Si quis dixerit statum conjugalem anteponendum esse statui virginitatis vel cœlibatus, et non esse melius ac beatius manere in virginitate aut cœlibatu, quam jungi matrimonio, anathema sit.

[1395] The feelings which the Council excited among the Protestants are expressed with more vigor than elegance by Alexander Nowell, at that time Dean of St. Paul’s—“No Sir, your Prelats sat not there about conning of Articles of Religion, or to Dispute with Hereticks to vanquish them. A few louzy Friars, whom no Man would fear but in his Pottage or Egg-py, did serve that Turn well enough. And your great Prelates devised the while by that long Consultation, how by Sword and Fire they might most cruelly murder all true Christians, whom they call Hereticks; and now do labour to put in Execution such their bloody Devices.”—Strype’s Annals, I. 377.

[1396] Concil. Trident. Sess. XXV. Decret. de Reformat. cap. 14,15.

[1397] Ma noi facciamo quello che ci si permette di fare, non quello che vorremmo.—Examinatore, Firenze, 1868, p. 15.

[1398] Lett. No. LXIX. (Ed. Amsterd. II. 299). This and the concluding letters are not in Mansi’s edition.

[1399] Pallavicini, Lib. XXII. c. 10.

[1400] Goldast. II. 380.—Le Plat, VI. 310, 312.

It is observable from this that many priests left the church and married without formally embracing the Lutheran faith, and a return of these was anticipated from a relaxation of the canons. Others, as may be gathered from various references above, married and still performed their regular duties. Of these, some no doubt acted in virtue of dispensations granted by the nuncios of Paul III., after the promulgation of the Interim, but many did so in utter contempt of discipline. An illustrative example of the latter class may be found in the well-known Stanislas Orzechowski, whose marriage, notwithstanding his prominent position, shows the laxity of opinion which prevailed on the subject. As priest and canon of Przemysl in Poland, his marriage naturally gave great offence to his colleagues, which was not diminished by a dissertation which he wrote in favor of priestly marriage. This, he subsequently claimed, had been prepared for the purpose of laying before the council of Trent, and its publication had arisen from the indiscretion of a friend to whom he had entrusted it. Somewhat contaminated with the new ideas by his education at Wittenberg, he sturdily refused to give up either his wife or his position. His consequent excommunication he disregarded, though according to his own account he gave up on marrying his benefices and the ministry (Lettera a Guilio III. trad. di B. Leoni, Milano, anno. VI.), and notwithstanding this he had a very narrow escape from the death-penalty, and his condemnation excited a commotion throughout Poland that was very favorable to the spread of the reformed opinions (Orichovii Annales, pp. 71-84, 108, Ed. 1854). At length the feeling against the pretensions of the church became so strong that the Diet of 1552 removed all the civil and temporal penalties of excommunication, so that he triumphed for the time. When in 1556, the legate Lippomani held a synod at Lovictz, he called to account those who had connived at so great an irregularity. They denied granting the dispensation, saying that they had only suspended the censures until the pleasure of the pope should be known; but at the same time many prelates used all their influence with Lippomani to obtain one. Lippomani declared that he had no power to grant it, nor would he do so if he could, seeing that Orzechowski defended himself on heretical grounds (Concil. Lovitiens.—Labbei et Coleti Supp. T. V. p. 702). In 1561 Orzechowski, in his address to the synod of Warsaw, admitted that he had sinned, but claimed that he had been punished sufficiently—“Si quis igitur a me quærat; Num uxorem sacerdos duxerim? Duxisse me fatebor. Peccasti igitur? Peccavi. Pœnas ergo peccati debes? Debui et persolvi” (Doctrina de Sacerd. Cœlibatu, Varsaviæ, 1801). He therefore complained of the persecutions to which he was exposed on account of his wife, and he petitioned both the pope and the council of Trent for a dispensation. While the Tridentine fathers refused it, some authors assert that it was granted by Pius IV. to him as an exceptional case “tibi soli Orichovio,” but careful investigation has failed to discover the Bull, and, according to Zaccaria the pope merely sent secret orders to his legate Commendone not to allow Orzechowski to be molested, but at the same time to give no publicity to an act of tolerance in contravention of the canons of the council of Trent (Grégoire, Hist du Mariage des Prêtres en France, pp. 51-55).

In his answer to Fricius, Orzechowski assumes that he was absolved from his excommunication by the Legate—“Præterea a sententia excommunicationis, qua eram a Joanne Episcopo Premisliensi, ob hanc eandem uxorem, ex ecclesia pulsus, a Legato Romani Petri absolutus cum sim, nihil feci contra ilium” (_ap._ Doctrin. de Sacerd. Cœlibat. p. 24). He also alleges the extraordinary excuse that he abandoned the priesthood before his marriage.

The history of Orzechowski, with probably a less fortunate result, is no doubt that of innumerable others, whose obscurity has prevented their sufferings from being known beyond their own narrow circle.

Strype (Annals, I. 485-6) asserts that after the accession of Queen Elizabeth the Catholic emissaries in England had a general dispensation to marry, in order to assist their concealment and to further the design of creating schism in the Anglican church. He gives as his authority one Malachi Malone, a converted Irish friar.

[1401] Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. VI. 331.

[1402] This was not his first attempt of this kind. In 1540 he had called upon John Cochlæus to examine the Confession of Augsburg and report as to what points were reconcilable with Catholicism and what were not. Cochlæus responded in an elaborate dissertation, wherein he took strong ground against abandoning celibacy, but admitted that he was utterly unable to suggest any remedy for the evils resulting from it,—especially the “scandalosus presbyterorum in seculo concubinatus, præsertim apud plebanos in pagis, qui communiter cum ancillis rem domesticam gubernare necessitate quadam coguntur.”—Le Plat, II. 667.

[1403] G. Cassandri Consult, XXIII., XXV. (Le Plat, VI. 761-2, 783-4).

[1404] Wicelii Via Regia, De Conjug. Sacerd.

Both these tracts were printed with other controversial matter, by Hermann Conring, 4to. Helmstadt, 1569.

[1405] Goldast. II. 381.

[1406] Le Plat, VI. 335.

[1407] De Thou, Lib. xxxvii.

[1408] In 1560 Ferdinand addressed to Pius IV. an earnest request that a special dispensation might be granted to Maximilian, then king of Bohemia, authorizing him to receive the communion in both elements. In this he stated that his son’s scruples of conscience on the subject were so strong that he had abstained for three years from taking the sacrament. In the secret instructions to the Imperial ambassador accompanying this request, the latter is furnished with elaborate reasons to prove that the suspicions entertained at Rome of Maximilian’s orthodoxy were unfounded.—Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. IV. 619-23.

[1409] Le Plat, VI. 336.

[1410] Struvii Corp. Hist. German. II. 1097.

[1411] Bernardi Sermo. 66, in Cantica, cap. i.

[1412] Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. V. 340.

[1413] The council of Trent has never been received in France. For a résumé of the efforts made to obtain its adoption and their uniform lack of success, see Chavart, Le Célibat des Prêtres, pp. 507-12.

[1414] In August, 1564, Philip II. had ordered its publication in the Low Countries, but Margaret of Parma had hesitated to obey in consequence of the intense opposition excited by its interference with local liberties and franchises, as it completed and crowned the centralizing policy which rendered the papacy supreme over all local churches. It was not until Dec. 18, 1565, that it was finally promulgated, under imperative commands from Philip. It is characteristic of Philip’s habitual double-dealing, however, that while his public orders commanded the reception of the Council without exception, he secretly reserved the rights of himself and his subjects (Le Plat, Concil. Trident. VII. Præf. p. vi.).

[1415] By a Bull dated July 18, 1564, Pius IV. fixed May 1, 1564, as the time when the Tridentine canons became the law of the church. His letter to the Archbishop of Bremen with an official copy and directions as to its promulgation, is dated Oct. 3d of the same year (Hartzheim VII. 25).

It would seem to be a work of supererogation for a learned Italian lawyer to write an elaborate treatise, dedicated to Pius IV., against the abolition of celibacy, yet Marquardo dei Susani thought it worth while to do this in his “Tractatus de Cœlibatu Sacerdotum non abrogando,” 4to. Venice, 1565.

[1416] Bull. Cum primum § 12 (Mag. Bull. Roman. II. 180).

[1417] “Plerosque ... abjecto Dei timore et sine ulla hominum verecundia, concubinas palam habere, easque perinde, ac si legitimæ eorum uxores essent, in ecclesiis et aliis locis publicis conspici, vulgo iisdem, quibus illi vocantur, officiorum et dignitatum nominibus appellatas; eoque hæreses tantopere crevisse, ac multiplicatas fuisse; quod ecclesiastici tam turpiter et nequiter vivendo, omnem plane existimationem amiserint, et in summam non apud hæreticos modo, sed etiam Catholicos contemptionem venerint.... Nisi enim tam nefandum concubinatus vitium extirpetur, nullam spem reliquam esse videmus reprimi posse hæreses. Sed timemus (quod Deus avertat) ne brevi tempore istæ, quæ supersunt, Catholicorum reliquias amittantur, et omnis prorsus Catholicæ religionis cultus apud vos extinguatur.”—Breve Pii V. ad Archiep. Salzburg. (Hartzheim VII. 231).

[1418] Bull. Horrendum (Mag. Bull. Roman. II. 267).

[1419] Dalham, Concil. Salisburgens. p. 556.

[1420] De Thou, Hist. Univers. Lib. XXXVIII. ann. 1566.

[1421] Bull. Quæ ordini.—How difficult was the task thus undertaken is admitted in the Bull itself—“Quia vero difficile nimis esset, præsentes quocumque illis opus erit proferre” (Ibid. II. 323-4).

[1422] Bull. Ad Romanum. (Mag. Bull. Roman. II. 325).

[1423] Synod. August. ann. 1610 P. III. c. iii. § 1 (Hartzheim IX. 59).

[1424] In hac etiam urbe meretrices ut matronæ incedunt per urbem, seu mula vehuntur, quas affectantur de media die nobiles familiares cardinalium clericique. Nulla in urbe vidimus hanc corruptionem, præterquam in hac omnium exemplari, habitant etiam insignes ædes: corrigendus etiam hic turpis abusus.—Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 604.

[1425] De Thou, Lib. XXXIX.

[1426] Bull. Postquam verus (Mag. Bull. Roman. II. 567)—“Certum nequeat suæ testimonium continentiæ exhibere.”

[1427] Fleury, Liv. CLXXI. chap. 104 et seq.

[1428] Muratori, Annal. ann. 1569.—Henrion, Hist. des Ordres Religieux I. 196.—Fleury, Liv. CLXXI. chap. 26.—De Thou, Lib. L.—The calm Muratori stigmatizes the Umiliati as “troppo scorretto e corrotto ordine,” and Henrion, who cannot certainly be regarded as a prejudiced authority, declares that “les excès des Humiliés surpassoient ceux des laïques les plus débauchés.” Pius V., in his Bull suppressing the order, is equally emphatic, and vouches for the truth of the miracle by which the life of St. Charles was preserved.—Bull. Quemadmodum sollicitus (Mag. Bull. Rom. II. 326).

[1429] Vû que par toute l’Italie on le vit reconnoitre pour l’usage et observations de toutes les ordonnances, on n’en voit une seule entretenue de celles qui concerne la reformation de la vie et mœurs des ecclésiastiques.... Et ce peut dire pour ce regard que l’église n’est en autre lieu de la Chrétienté si déréglée et difforme qu’ès pays où le pape a commandement et puissance absolu.—Le Plat, VII. 259.

[1430] Concil. Mediolanens. ann. 1565 P. II. Const. xiv. (Harduin. X. 661)—Concil. Mediolanens. ann. 1582 Const. xiv. (Ibid. p. 1117).

[1431] Concil. Sipontin. ann. 1567 De Vit. et Honest. Cleric.—Concil. Ravennat. ann. 1568 De Vit. et Honest. Cleric. c. v.—Concil. Urbinat. ann. 1569 De Vit. et Honest. Cleric. c. vi.—Concil. Florent. ann. 1573 Rubr. XXXVII. c. 3, 4.—Concil. Neapol. ann. 1576 cap. XXII.—Concil. Consentin. ann. 1579 Sess. IV.—Concil. Salernit. ann. 1596 cap. XVIII.—Concil. S. Severin. ann. 1597 De Vit. et Honest. Cleric.—Concil. Amalfitan. ann. 1597 De Vit. et Honest. Cleric. c. v.—(Labbei et Coleti Supplement. T. V. pp. 827-1331).

[1432] The documents are in Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. VII. 199-201. For the condition of morals in the church of Holland, see Synod. Harlem. ann. 1564; Synod. Ultraject. ann. 1564; Concil. Ultraject. ann. 1565 (Hartzheim VII. 5, 22, 137). It was to the publication of the council of Trent that William of Orange attributed the inevitable revolution which followed (Stradæ de Bell. Belgic. Lib. iv.).

[1433] Synod. Salisburg. ann. 1569 Const. XXVII. cap. xviii., xix., xx., xxi., xxii. (Hartzheim VII. 306-8).

[1434] Concil. Salisburg. XLVII. (Dalham, Conc. Salisb. p. 583).

[1435] Visitat. Salisburg. ann. 1616 Tit. I. cap. vi. (Hartzheim IX. 266).

[1436] Decret. Reformat. Pragens. (Hartzheim VII. 53).

[1437] Statut. Rural. Julii Wirceburg. P. III. c. iv. (Gropp Script. Rer. Wirceburg. I. 471-4). It is somewhat remarkable that Bishop Julius attributes the prohibition of marriage to the Council of Nicæa. After describing the custom of the Greek church, he proceeds, “Permissio vero et consuetudo illa duravit usque ad Nicænum concilium, in quo generali decreto abrogata est, statutumque ne aliquis habens uxorem consecretur sacerdos”—a falsification which is equally singular, whether it proceeded from ignorance or fraud, and an admission that celibacy was not of apostolic origin which was rare in a Catholic prelate of that period.

[1438] Synod. Gnesnens. c. xxxiii. (Hartzheim VII. 891).

[1439] Synod. Wratislav. ann. 1580 (Hartzheim VII. 890).

[1440] Synod. Olomucens. ann. 1591 c. xiii. (Hartzheim VIII. 352).

[1441] Synod. Osnabrug. ann. 1628 (Hartzheim IX. 431).—As usual, a distinction is drawn between those who thus formed permanent, though illicit connections, and others who indulged in promiscuous license—“alii vaga dissoluti lascivia, tanquam equi emissarii, ad incontinentissimum quodque scortum aut adulteram adhinniunt trahuntque ingentes liberorum spuriorum greges. Hæc in propatulo sunt; quæ vero in occulto fiunt ab ipsis, turpe est et dicere.”

[1442] Llorente, Histoire Critique de l’Inquisition d’Espagne, Chap. XXVIII. Art. iii. No. 7.

[1443] Statut. Diœces. Pragens. ann. 1565 (Hartzheim VII. 26).

[1444] Synod. Salisburg. ann. 1569 (Hartzheim VII. 407).

[1445] Le Plat, VII. 238.

[1446] Synod. Oriolan. ann. 1600 cap. xxxviii. (Aguirre, VI. 457).

[1447] Henr. Cuyckii Speculum Concubinariorum Sacerdotum, Monachorum ac Clericorum; Coloniæ, 1599.

[1448] Synod. Constant. ann. 1609 (Hartzheim VIII. 838). Another orator, Dr. Mayer, S. J., though more cautious in his deductions, was equally outspoken in his denunciations of the wickedness of the clergy (Ibid. p. 831).

[1449] Synod. Antverp. ann. 1610 (Hartzheim VIII. 979).

[1450] Damhouder. Rerum Crimin. Praxis cap. xxxvii. No. 25 (Antverp. 1601).

[1451] Synod. Boscodunens. II. ann. 1612 (Hartzheim IX. 200).

[1452] Synod. Osnabrug. ann. 1625 cap. v., x. Hartzheim IX. 350.—Synod. Osnabrug. ann. 1628 (Ibid. p. 428).

[1453] Synod. Monasteriens. ann. 1652 (Hartzheim IX. 786-7).

[1454] Synod. Colon. ann. 1662 P. III. Tit. I. cap. 1 § iii. (Hartzheim IX. 1006).

[1455] Mag. Bull. Roman. Ed. Luxemb. 1742, T. VI. App. p. 2.

[1456] Pierre de la Place, Estat. de Relig. etc. Liv. III.

[1457] Quick, Synod. Gall. Reform. I. 18.

[1458] Fleury, Hist. Eccles. Liv. CLVII. Nos. 37-42.

[1459] Chavard, Le Célibat des Prêtres, p. 401.

[1460] Concil. Remens. ann. 1564, Stat. XVII. (Harduin. X. 477).

[1461] Concil. Camerac. ann. 1565, Rubr. VIII. c. 3.—At this council, which was held in June, 1565, the council of Trent was formally adopted. As forming part of _Flandre Française_, Cambray may properly be considered as French, though Francis I., by the treaty of Madrid in 1526, had been compelled to surrender his sovereignty, and till a hundred years later it continued under Spanish dominion.

[1462] Concil. Camerac. ann. 1567 c. iii. (Hartzheim VII. 216).

[1463] Synod. Camerac. ann. 1631 Tit. XVIII. c. xiv. (Ibid. IX. 562).

[1464] Claudii Episc. Ebroicens. Statut. cap. III. § 1 (Migne’s Patrol. Tom. 147 pp. 244-5.)

[1465] Concil. Remens. ann. 1583 cap. xviii. § 5 (Harduin. X. 1293).

[1466] Concil. Turon. ann. 1583 cap. xv. (Ibid. p. 1481).

[1467] Concil. Avenionens. ann. 1594 can. xxxii. (Ibid. p. 1854).

[1468] Concil. Burdigalens. ann. 1624 cap. xiii. § 2. (Harduin. XI. 96).

[1469] Synod. Tornacens. ann. 1574 Tit. xii. c. 5, 6, 7 (Hartzheim VII. 780).—Synod. Audomarens. ann. 1583 Tit. xvi. c. 2 (Ibid. VII. 947). Concil. Burdigalens. ann. 1583 can. xxi. (Harduin. X. 1360).—Concil. Bituricens. ann. 1584 Tit. xlii. can. 1-4 (Ibid. X. 1503-4).—Concil. Aquens. ann. 1585 cap. de Vit. et Honestate Cleric. (Ibid. X. 1547).—Concil. Narbonnens. ann. 1609 cap. xli. (Ibid. XI. 96).

[1470] Du Fail, whose high official position in the Parlement of Rennes precludes the supposition of any tendency to Calvinism, devotes one of his discourses (Contes et Discours d’Eutrapel No. xx.) to the evils entailed by celibacy on the church and on society, quoting the exclamation of Cardinal Contarini to Velly the French ambassador, “O quæ mala attulit in ecclesia cœlibatus ille!” It is true that such stories as “Frater Fecisti” are not historical documents, yet they have their value as indicating the drift of public feeling and the convictions forced upon the minds of the people by the irregularities of the clerical profession. The same lesson is taught by Boccaccio, Piers Ploughman, Chaucer, Poggio, the Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles, and all the other records of the interior life of the 14th, 15th, and 16th centuries.

[1471] Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. VII. 136.—Collect. Synod. Mechlin. Tom. I. pp. 39, 57.—Synod. Mechlin. ann. 1570 Tit. xiv. (Ibid. I. 118).—Synod. Lovaniens. ann. 1574 (Ibid. I. 191).—Synod. Provin. Mechlin. ann. 1607 Tit. XVIII. c. viii. (Ibid. I. 395).—Synod. Diœces. Mechlin. ann. 1607 Tit. XVII. c. vi. (Ibid. II. 237).—Congregat. Archipresbyt. ann. 1613 (Ibid. II. 271).—Tertia Congregat. Episc. ann. 1624 (Ibid. I. 466).—Ibid. I. 514.

Synod. Augustan. ann. 1567 P. III. c. ii. (Hartzheim VII. 182).—Synod. Constant. ann. 1567 P. II. Tit. i. c. 9 (Ibid. VII. 541).—Synod. Ruremond. ann. 1570 (Ibid. VII. 653).—Synod. Boscodunens. ann. 1571 Tit. xiv. c. ii. (Ibid. VII. 723).—Synod. Warmiens. ann. 1577 c. i. (Ibid. VII. 871).—Synod. Mettens. ann. 1604 c. xlviii., liii., lxii. (Ibid. X. 768-70).—Synod. Brixiens. ann. 1603 De discip. cler. c. xviii. (Ibid. VIII. 576).—Synod. Namurcens. ann. 1604 Tit. VIII. c. vi. (Ibid. VIII. 623).—Synod. Constant. ann. 1609 P. II. Tit. xvii. c. 7 (Ibid. VIII. 906).—Synod. Mettens. ann. 1610 Tit. XI. c. xi. (Ibid. VIII. 962).—Synod. Antverp. ann. 1610 Tit. XVII. c. vi. (Ibid. VIII. 1003).—Statut. Visitat. Salisburgens. ann. 1616 Tit. I. c. vi. (Ibid. IX. 266).—Synod. Iprens. ann. 1629 c. xx. (Ibid. IX. 496).—Synod. Namurcens. ann. 1639 Tit. XIX. c. ix., x. (Ibid. IX. 592-3).—Synod. Audomar. ann. 1640 Tit. XIV. c. vii. (Ibid. X. 802).—Synod. Colon. ann. 1651 P. II. c. ii. § 1 (Ibid. IX. 742).—Synod. Hildesheim. ann. 1652 (Ibid. IX. 805-6).—Synod. Colon. ann. 1662 P. III. Tit. ii. c. 1, 2, 3 (Ibid. IX. 1008-11).—Statut. Synod. Trevirens. ann. 1678 c. xi., xii., xiii., xiv. (Ibid. X. 60).—Statut. Synod. Argentinens. ann. 1687 De clericis addit. I. (Ibid. X. 180).—Synod. Brugens. ann. 1693 Tit. v. § 2 (Ibid. X. 202).—Cod. Canon. Mettens. ann. 1699 Tit. x. c. xviii. (Ibid. X. 245).—Synod. Bisuntin. ann. 1707 Tit. II. c. xxv. (Ibid. X. 291).—Synod. Culmens. et Pomesan. ann. 1745 c. ix. (Ibid. X. 517).

Concil. Toletan. ann. 1565 Act. II. cap. xxii.; Act. III. cap. xix., xxv. (Aguirre V. 396, 405-6).—Concil. Valentin. ann. 1565 Tit. II. cap. xviii., xix. (Ib. 425).—Concil. Toletan. ann. 1582 Act. III. Decret. xxxv. (Ib. VI. 12).—Concil. Tarraconens. ann. 1591 Lib. I. Tit. viii.; Lib. III. Tit. ii. (Ib. 256, 271-3).—Synod. Oriolan. ann. 1600 cap xxxiii. (Ib. 456).

[1472] Ratio est quia tunc non dimittit habitum ut periculose vagetur, sed ut commodius fornicetur, vel liberius furetur.—Apud C. Chabot, Encyclopédie Monastique p. 24 (Paris, 1827).

[1473] Spatharius, Aurea Methodus corrigendi regulares, 1625, p. 57—“atque mea sententia, in totalem ordinis ruinam et destructionem singularum religionum” (Apud Chabot, op. cit. p. 95).

[1474] Concil. Mexican. I. ann. 1555 cap. lvii.—The first and second Mexican Councils are not contained in Aguirre’s collection, but were printed, together with the third, by Archbishop Lorenzana, in two folio volumes, Mexico, 1769. The Third Council has also been reprinted in Mexico, in 1858, as a manual of existing local ecclesiastical law.

[1475] Constituciones Sinodales de Santafé, 1556 cap. IV. (Groot, Hist. Eccles. y Civil del Nuevo Reino de Granada, T. I. Append, ii. p. 497).

[1476] Synod Diœc. Limens. III. ann. 1585 cap. xi., lxvii. (Aguirre, VI. 193, 198).

[1477] Concil. Mexican. I. ann. 1555 cap. li.—Concil. Mexican. III. ann. 1585 Lib. V. Tit. x. § 8.

[1478] Aguirre, VI. 51, 55.—The canons of the council directed against concubinage &c. are Act. III. c. 18, 19, 20, 23, 24 (Ibid. pp. 40-41).

[1479] Synod. Diœc. Limens. III. ann. 1585 cap. xxxvi.—Synod. VIII. ann. 1594 cap. xxxvi.—Concil. Provin. Limens. III. ann. 1601 Act. II. Decret. iv. (Aguirre, VI. 197-8, 436, 479).

[1480] Mendieta, Historia Eccles. Indiana, Lib. IV. cap. xlvi. (Mexico, 1870).

[1481] Memorias de los Vireyes del Perú, Lima, 1859, T. III. pp. 63-70.

[1482] Synod. Diœc. Limens. III. ann. 1585 cap. xli.—V. ann. 1588 cap. ix. (Aguirre VI. 198, 216).

[1483] Concil. Mexican. I. ann. 1555 cap. lxxxi.

[1484] Concil. Mexican. III. ann. 1585 Lib. V. Tit. x. § 7.

[1485] Notes 57 and 229, pp. 452, 549.

[1486] Concil. Trident. Sess. XXIV. De Reform. Matrim. c. viii.—It requires some artful special pleading on the part of Rivera and of the authorities on whom he relies to reconcile this Mexican laxity with the instructions of the council of Trent.

[1487] For the brutal details of the questions which the confessor was required to ask of his penitents, female as well as male, see Burchardi Decretorum Lib. XIX. c. v. I dare not give even a specimen.

[1488] Concil. I. Toletan. ann. 398 can. vi. For the custom of the early church in the matter of the confession of sins, see Socrates, H. E. V. xix., and Sozomen, H. E. VII. xvi.—In the ninth century it was still an open question whether sacerdotal confession was necessary, v. Concil. Cabillon. II. ann. 813 c. xxxiii. (Cf. c. xxv. xxxii.). It was finally settled and auricular confession made obligatory by the Council of Lateran in 1215 (Concil. Lateranens. IV. ann. 1215 c. xxi.).

[1489] Gratian. Caus. xxx. q. i. can. 8—I accept this decretal as genuine on Jaffé’s authority, though its authenticity seems to me more than doubtful.

[1490] Gratian. Caus. xxx. q. i. can. 9, 10.

[1491] See ante, passim, especially p. 350.

[1492] Calixti II. Serm. I. de S. Jacob. (Migne’s Patrolog. T. 163 p. 1390).—The genuineness of these sermons has been doubted, but they are unquestionably, if not by Calixtus, by a writer nearly contemporary.

[1493] Perrens, Jérome Savonarole, p. 71. See also Cornelius Agrippa, De Vanitate Scientiar. c. lxiv.

[1494] Limborch Hist. Inquisitionis p. 34.

[1495] Bernard. Diaz de Luco Pract. Crimin. Canon. cap. LXXV., LXXVI. (Ed. 1543, pp. 72-3).

[1496] Llorente, Hist. de l’Inquisition d’Espagne, Ch. XXVIII. Art. i. No. 4.

[1497] Bull. Cum sicut nuper (Mag. Bull. Rom. II. 4. Ed. 1742).

[1498] Reg. Gonsalvii Montan. Inquisit. Hispan. Exemplis Illustrata, pp. 184 sqq. (Ed. Heidelbergæ, 1567).

[1499] Llorente, loc. cit. Nos. 6-8.

[1500] Bull. Universi Dominici Gregis. (Mag. Bull. Rom. III. 484).

In Spain, by the Carta Acordada of Aug. 3d, 1629, the Bull of Gregory XV. was to be referred to in the Edict of Denunciation; and by the Carta of Sept. 12th, 1634, a clause was to be added to the Edict to the effect that notwithstanding the Bull, the offence was reserved exclusively to the Inquisition.—Breve Resumen de las Cartas Acordadas antiquas y modernas, dispuesto por Abecedario, s. v. Solicitante (MS. Bib. Reg. Hafniens. No. 218_b_, p. 264). That the Court of Rome kept faith in the matter of solicitation would seem to be proved by a case occurring in 1695 when Dr. Augustin Velda, rector of La Sallana in Valencia was accused before the Inquisition, and fled to Rome, where he presented himself to the Sacred Congregation and was ordered to return. This he did, but with what result is not noted (Ibid. p. 339). [This exceedingly interesting MS. is a manual for use in one of the tribunals of the Spanish Inquisition, compiled about the year 1670, with notes bringing it down to the middle of the 18th century. I take this occasion of expressing my obligations to the gentlemen in charge of the Royal Library of Copenhagen, of the Bodleian Library of Oxford, and of the Royal Library of Munich, for their courtesy in communicating to me a number of MSS.]

[1501] Referred to in a Decree of 1745 (Bullar. Benedicti XIV. T. I. p. 291).

[1502] Pontas, Dict. de Cas de Conscience, Paris, 1741, T. I. p. 862.—Amort, Diet. Selectt. Casuum Conscientiæ, Aug. Vind. 1733, T. I. pp. 704-5. From the latter we learn that a few years previously the Franciscans of Bavaria had agreed to receive the Bull in so far as to prohibit any of their confessors from absolving a penitent who had been solicited by those of their own order, unless she would permit him to denounce the culprit to the Superior—an example which the writer wishes were followed elsewhere, as it would be very useful in repressing many scandals which afflicted the German church.

[1503] Rodriguez, Nueva Somma de ’Casi de Coscienza, P. I. cap. LIII. No. 10.

[1504] Rod. à Cunha pro SS. D. N. PP. Pauli V. Statuto nuper emisso in Confessarios Feminas solicitantes Quæst. XXII. No. 3; XXIII. No. 4, 5, 6, 8, 11, 12, 14 (4to. Benavente 1611).

[1505] Ant. de Sousa Opusc. circa Constit. Pauli PP. V. in Confessarios allicientes etc. 4to. Ulyssip. 1623, Tract. I. cap. xviii.

[1506] Ibid. Tract. II. cap. xviii. No. 9-12.

[1507] MS. Bib. Reg. Hafniens. No. 218_b_, p. 264.

[1508] Ibid. pp. 264-5.

[1509] Llorente, Chap. XXVIII. Art. i. Nos. 20, 23.

[1510] Ibid. Art. ii.

[1511] Ibid. Ch. XL. Art. ii. Nos. 2-14.

[1512] Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 602.—Caraffa and his coadjutors, indeed, went so far as to suggest the entire suppression of the conventual orders (Ibid. 601).

[1513] A printed copy of this Bull occurs in some voluminous pleadings between the church of Cordova and the Inquisition, in 1643.—MS. Bibl. Bodl. Arch. S. 130.

[1514] De Potter, Vie de Scipion de’Ricci, T. I. pp. 87 sqq. 258 sqq.

[1515] Michelet, La Sorcière, Ch. IX.

[1516] Llorente, Chap. XXVIII. Art. i. No. 14.

[1517] The dangerous suggestiveness of the questions asked in the confessional was recognized, and confessors were sometimes warned to be careful.—Synod. Diœces. Mechlin. II. ann. 1609 Tit. v. cap. i.

[1518] See, for instance, Concil. Toletan. ann. 1582, Decret. XXVIII., XXIX. (Aguirre, VI. 11).—Synod. Oriolan. ann. 1600 cap. xix. (Ib. p. 450).—Synod. Beneventan. ann. 1693 Tit. LIV. c. iii. (Collect. Lacens. I. 94).—Synod. Neapol. ann. 1699 Tit. XI. c. i. No. 11 (Ib. p. 232). Also a curious list of twenty abuses of the confessional in a letter from the Bishop of Antwerp to the Archbishop of Mechlin in 1624 (Synodicon Mechliniense, T. I. p. 474).

[1519] Instructions for a Parish Priest, p. 27 (Early Eng. Text Soc. 1868).

[1520] As specimens of this, I may refer to Cardinal Cozza’s “Dubia Selecta emergentia circa Sollicitationem in Confessione Sacramentali juxta Apostolicas Constitutiones” Lovanii, 1750—and the similar works by à Cunha and de Sousa, quoted above.

[1521] Cozza, op. cit. Dub. XVII. No. 112.

[1522] Mag. Bull. Roman. Tom. VI. App. p. 1.

[1523] Occasional references to this practice may be found in earlier times. See, for instance, Concil. Monasteriens. ann. 1279 c. xv. (Hartzheim III. 649)—Suppression of Monasteries, No. XVII. (Camden Soc.).—Synod. Tornacens. ann. 1520 c. vii. (Hartzheim VI. 156).

[1524] V. Pontas, Dict. de Cas de Conscience, I. 836.

[1525] Conc. Trident. Sess. XIV. De Pœnitent. c. vi.

[1526] Del Bene de Offic. S. Inquisit. P. II. Dub. CCXXXVII. § ix. No. 6.

[1527] Cozza, op. cit. Dub. XXXIII.

[1528] Mag. Bull. Roman. Tom. VI. App. p. 1.

[1529] Synod. Camerac. ann. 1661 c. xi. (Hartzheim IX. 888).—Synodicon Mechliniense II. 319.

[1530] Ibid. I. 559.

[1531] Synod. Namurcens. ann. 1698 c. xxviii. (Hartzheim X. 219).

[1532] Synod. Bisuntin. ann. 1707 Tit. XIV. c. xiv. (Ibid. 323).

[1533] Pontas, Dict. de Cas de Conscience Paris, 1741, T. I. p. 837.—From the German edition of Amort (Dict. selectt. Casuum Conscientiæ, Aug. Vind. 1733) we learn that the state of the canon law on this subject was the same in Germany as in France.

[1534] Bull. Sacrament. Pœnitent. § 4 (Bullar. Benedicti XIV. T. I. p. 23).—In 1742 he extended the provisions of this constitution over the Greek churches subject to Rome.—Bull. Etsi pastoralis § IX. No. v. (Concil. Collect. Lacens. II. 518).

[1535] Benedict. XIV. Const. CXX. § 3 (Bullar. I. 219).

[1536] Ibid. p. 291.

[1537] Llorente, Chap. XVIII. Art. i. No. 13.

[1538] Synod. Namurcens. ann. 1742 c. iv. (Hartzheim X. 487).

[1539] Instruct. Pastoral. ann. 1768 c. xcvii. (Ibid. 638).

[1540] Instruct. S. Inquisit. Roman. ann. 1867 (Collect. Lacens. III. 554).—Litt. Past. Episc. Caradrens. XXVII. 2, 3 (Ibid. VI. 646-7).

[1541] Ap. Helsen, Abus du Célibat des Prêtres, p. 87.

[1542] See, for instance, the manner in which Escobar (Theolog. Moralis Tract. I. Ex. viii. cap. 3 No. 80) and Avila (De Censuris Eccles. P. VII. Disp. IV. Dub. vii. in fin.) explain away the Bull of Pius V. contra clericos sodomitas.

[1543] Factum pour Marie Catherine Cadière, La Haye, 1731, pp. 142-44.

[1544] Michelet, La Sorcière, Chap. X., XI., XII.—After reading the pleadings on both sides (published at the Hague in 1731), I can entertain no doubt as to the guilt of Girard. The case at the time attracted general attention throughout Europe.

[1545] When Grandier was arrested and tried for sorcery, his papers were seized, and among them was found an essay against sacerdotal celibacy. Under torture, he confessed that he had written it for the purpose of satisfying the conscience of a woman with whom he had maintained marital relations for seven years (Hist. des Diables de Loudun, pp. 85, 191). The manuscript was burnt, with its unlucky author, but a copy was preserved, which has recently been printed (Petite Bibliothèque des Curieux, Paris, 1866). In it, Grandier shows himself singularly bold for a man of his time and station. The law of nature, or moral law, he holds to be the direct exposition of the Divine will. By it revealed law must necessarily be interpreted, and to its standard ecclesiastical law must be made to conform. He evidently was made to be burned as a heretic, if he had escaped as a sorcerer. The promise of chastity exacted at ordination he regards as extorted, and therefore as not binding on those unable to keep it; while he does not hesitate to assume that the rule itself was adopted and enforced on purely temporal grounds—“de crainte qu’en remuant une pierre on n’esbranlat la puissance papale; car hors cette considération d’Estat, l’Eglise romaine pense assez que le célibat n’est pas d’institution divine ni nécessaire au salut, puisqu’elle en dispense les particuliers, ce qu’elle ne pourrait faire si le célibat avoit esté ordonné d’en haut” (pp. 34-5).

[1546] Notwithstanding his Sorbonic degree, Du Pin is said to have been secretly married, and to have left a widow, who even ventured to claim the inheritance of his estate. He was engaged in a correspondence with William Wake, Archbishop of Canterbury, with a view to arrange a basis of reconciliation of the Anglican Church with Rome, and, according to Lafitau, Bishop of Sisteron, in that correspondence he assented to the propriety of sacerdotal marriage.

[1547] I cannot pretend to decide the controversy as to the alleged marriage between Bossuet and Mdlle. Desvieux de Mauléon, nor to determine whether it is true that she and her daughters claimed his fortune after his death. Much has been written on both sides, and I have not the materials at hand to justify a positive opinion, though the extracts from La Baumelle’s “Mémoires de Madame de Maintenon” given by the Abbé Chavard (Le Célibat des Prêtres, pp. 474 sqq.) would seem to show that there were good grounds for asserting the marriage. I believe, however, that there is no doubt of Bossuet engaging with Leibnitz and Molanus in a negotiation as to the terms on which the Lutherans could reënter the Roman communion, and that he promised, in the name of the pope, that Lutheran ministers admitted to the priesthood or episcopate should retain their wives. It is asserted that the proposed arrangement was nearly agreed to on both sides, when the pretensions of the House of Hanover to the English crown caused Leibnitz to withdraw from the undertaking.

[1548] Chavard, Le Célibat des Prêtres, p. 314-5.—Davanzati, Bishop of Canosa, was also in favor of abrogating the rule of celibacy.

[1549] This view of the competence of the temporal power to regulate the question seems to have been widely received at this period. An anonymous work published in 1769 under the title of “Recherches sur l’État Monastique et Ecclésiastique,” written by a good Catholic, asserts (p. 204), “Si le cas de donner des citoyens à la pàtrie devenoit urgent, le législateur, en autorisant le mariage des prêtres, n’entreprendroit rien sur le sacrement de l’Ordre.”

[1550] Zaccaria, in the introduction to his “Nuova Giustificazione” (p. ix.), denies that the papal court entertained any idea of making the concession; but, in considering the question as to the power or duty of the pope to alter the law of celibacy (Diss. IV. cap. 6), his remarks show clearly that the subject was discussed in a tone to afford the partisans of marriage reasonable grounds for hope. Among the threatening proceedings of the emperor was the suppression of no less than 184 monasteries (Lecky, Hist. of Rationalism, chap. vi.).

[1551] Vetus et Constans in Ecclesia Catholica de Sacerdotum Cœlibatu Doctrina. Varsaviæ, 1801.

[1552] “A Modest Apology for the Catholics of Great Britain,” published anonymously in 1800—a work singularly moderate and candid in its tone. Dr. Geddes had been suspended from his functions in consequence of a translation of the Bible which he had published. See Allibone’s Dictionary, I. 657.

[1553] Dupin, Manuel du Droit Pub. Ecclés. Français. 4_e_ Ed. Paris, 1845, p. 274.—Édit de Mars 1768, concernant les Ordres Religieux (Isambert, XXIII. 476).

[1554] See Lasteyrie’s Hist. of Auricular Confession, translated by Cocks, London, 1848, Book II. chap. iv., vi.

[1555] Bouvet, De la Confession et du Célibat des Prêtres, Paris, 1845, p. 504.

[1556] Archives of Florence—Segreterio di Stato nella Reggenza, Filza 194 No. 6.

[1557] De Potter, Mémoires de Scipion de’ Ricci, I. 284 sqq.

[1558] Atti e Decreti del Concilio di Pistoja dell’ anno 1786, Pistoja, 4to. pp. 237, 239.

[1559] Acta Congr. Archiep. et Episc. Hetruriæ Sess. XVIII. (Bambergæ 1790, T. I. p. 453).—Bull. Auctorem fidei ann. 1794 § § 80-84.

[1560] Chiesi (Rivista Cristiana, Dic. 1876 p. 470).—Concil. Trident. Sess. XXV. De Reg. et Mon. cap. xv.

[1561] Panzini, Confessione di un Prigioniero, p. 333.

[1562] Vie de Scipion de’ Ricci I. 289: II. 373 sqq.

[1563] Prattica del Modo da procedersi nelle cause del S. Offitio cap. xxv. (MS. Bibl. Reg. Monacens. Cod. Ital. 598).

[1564] Esaminatore, Firenze, Ap. 15th, 1867, p. 100. In Spain, an official return made in 1764 estimated the number of ecclesiastics, regular and secular, at 281,160 souls (Castillo y Mayone, Historia de los Frailes, III. 144).

[1565] “D’être fidèle à la nation, à la loi, au roi, et del veiler exactement sur le troupeau confié à leurs soins.” It was not only the objections of the king and of the pope that rendered this oath unpalatable, but also the fact that it gave adhesion to the law for the secularization of ecclesiastical property and of the monastic orders. It was ordered in the _Constitution civile du Clergé_, Tit. II. Art. 21, 38, adopted July 12 and promulgated Aug. 24, 1790.

[1566] I have before me one of the pamphlets issued about this time (Le Mariage des Prêtres, Paris, Laclaye, 1790, 8vo. pp. 102), addressed to the Assembly. It is a tolerably calm and well-reasoned argument, basing its demand upon the usages of the primitive church, the precepts of Scripture, the rights of nature, and public utility. The author asserts himself to be a priest well advanced in life, and he assumes that the corruption of society disseminated by the licentiousness of ecclesiastics is generally recognized and understood.

[1567] This speech is printed in full from a MS. in the public library of Geneva, by the Abbé Chavard (Le Célibat des Prêtres, pp. 483-500).

[1568] La loi ne reconnait ni vœux religieux, ni aucun autre engagement qui serait contraire aux droits naturels ou à la constitution.

[1569] Desmaze, Pénalités Anciennes, p. 222, Paris, 1866.

[1570] I have not found it easy to form a satisfactory estimate of the number of French ecclesiastics previous to the Revolution. Le Bas (Dictionnaire Encyclopédique de l’Histoire de France, V. 218) gives a table, showing an aggregate of 418,206 souls, of whom 235,147 may be considered as attached to the secular service, and 183,059 to the regular orders and canons. Of these latter, 100,451 were men and 82,608 were women. On the other hand, M. Sauvestre (Congrégations Religieuses, pp. 5, 6) quotes from the Abbé Expilly a statement that in 1765 there were 79,000 monks and 80,000 nuns; while he shows that other contemporary authorities reduce the number of members of religious orders in 1789 to 52,000 of both sexes. M. Charles Chabot (Encyclopédie Monastique, p. x., Paris, 1827) computes, after elaborate tabulation, the number of ecclesiastics, regular and secular, at 407,753 persons, enjoying a revenue of 127,610,576 francs.

[1571] Lett. Encyc. 15 Mars, 1795, art. IX. (Grégoire, p. 109).

[1572] This speech of Portalis _père_ is an admirable commentary on the Concordat, developing its causes and consequences with a rigidity of logic and an enlightened spirit of faith which are equally creditable to the head and heart of the distinguished orator. From the portion devoted to the subject of marriage, I quote the following, as embodying a clear exposition of the intentions of those who negotiated the Concordat.

“Quelques personnes se plaindront peut-être de ce que l’on n’a pas conservé le mariage des prêtres.... En effet, d’une part nous n’admettons plus que les ministres dont l’existence est nécessaire à l’exercice du culte, ce qui diminue considérablement le nombre des personnes qui se vouaient anciennement au célibat. D’autre part, pour les ministres mêmes que nous conservons, et à qui le célibat est ordonné par les réglements ecclésiastiques, la défense qui leur est faite du mariage par ces réglements n’est point consacrée comme _empêchement dirimant_ dans l’ordre civil: ainsi leur mariage, s’ils en contractaient un, ne serait point nul aux yeux des lois politiques et civiles, et les enfans qui en naîtraient seraient légitimes; mais dans le for intérieur et dans l’ordre religieux, ils s’exposeraient aux peines spirituelles prononcées par les lois canoniques: ils continueraient à jouir de leurs droits de famille et de cité, mais ils seraient tenus de s’abstenir de l’exercice du sacerdoce. Conséquemment, sans affaiblir le nerf de la discipline de l’église, on conserve aux individus toute la liberté et tous les avantages garantis par les lois de l’état; mais il eût été injuste d’aller plus loin, et d’exiger pour les ecclésiastiques de France, comme tels, une exception qui les eût déconsidérés auprès de tous les peuples Catholiques, et auprès des Français mêmes, auxquels ils administreraient les secours de la religion” (Dupin, Manuel du Droit Public Ecclés. Français, 4ème éd. pp. 196-8).

[1573] Code Civil, Liv. I. Tit. v.

[1574] In an address to the Council of State, Dec. 20th, 1813, Napoleon said, “Le sacerdoce est une sorte de mariage; le prêtre étant uni à l’église comme l’époux à son épouse, il n’y aurait aucun inconvénient à appliquer au prêtre qui se marierait la peine de la bigamie: un tel ecclésiastique ne mérite aucun sorte de considération”—Bouhier de l’Écluse, de l’État des Prêtres en France, Paris, 1842, p. 17.—Chavard (Le Célibat des Prêtres, pp. 409-10) quotes Dean Stanley as asserting, on the authority of the elder Duc de Broglie, that Pius VIII. spontaneously offered to Napoleon to permit sacerdotal marriage, but that the Emperor declined the proposal. I cannot but think, however, that there must be some mistake in this statement.

[1575] For many of the above details I am indebted to the curious but ill-digested little work—“Histoire du Mariage des Prêtres en France,” published by Grégoire in 1826. Grégoire, though a priest of the _ancien régime_, was a sincere and consistent republican. A member of the States General, of the Convention, and of the Council of Five Hundred, elected Bishop of Blois by the voice of a people who knew and respected him, he preserved his ardent faith through all the excesses of the Revolution, and his democratic ideas in spite of the injuries inflicted on his class in the name of the people. The sincerity and boldness of his character may be estimated by a single example. When, on the 7th of November, 1793, Gobel, Bishop of Paris, appeared before the Convention with twelve of his vicars and publicly renounced his sacred functions on the ground that hereafter there should be no other worship than that of liberty and equality, almost all the ecclesiastics in the Convention followed his example. To hold back at such a moment was dangerous in the extreme, yet Grégoire had the hardihood to utter a defiant protest. “I am a Catholic by conviction and by feeling, a priest by choice, a bishop by the voice of the people, but not from the people nor from you do I derive my mission, and I will not be forced to an abjuration.” To him perhaps more than to any one else is attributable the skilful management which carried the church through the storms and persecutions of the Revolution, but the same inflexibility which maintained his Catholicism through the ordeal of 1793 and 1794 caused him to stand by his republicanism long after it had gone out of fashion. He was not to be bought or bullied; the Legitimist was less tolerant than the Terrorist, and under the Restoration he was reduced almost to absolute indigence. Together with the other constitutional bishops, he had been compelled to resign his bishopric by order of the pope after the Concordat of 1801, and he was too dangerous a man to be rewarded for his invaluable services to religion. He died in 1831.

[1576] Grégoire, op. cit. p. 102.

[1577] Bouhier de l’Écluse, op. cit. It was apparently this case which led to the publication, under date of Monaco, 1829, of the “Considerazioni imparziali sopra la legge del Celibato Ecclesiastico, proposte dal Professore C. A. P.”—a tolerably well written summary of the arguments against the rule.

[1578] Talmadge’s Letters from Florence, p. 166.

[1579] Chavard, Le Célibat des Prêtres, pp. 525-30.

[1580] J. M. Cayla, Les Curés mariés par le Concile, Paris, 1869.

[1581] Encyc. Mirari vos.

[1582] Encyc. Qui pluribus.

[1583] Litt. Apostol. Multiplices inter.

[1584] Panzini, pp. 16, 58, 102, 143, 201, 401.

[1585] Ibid. p. 123.

[1586] Naples was, perhaps, the first kingdom in Europe to promulgate a civil marriage law, and to withdraw matrimonial cases from ecclesiastical jurisdiction. This was one of the reforms of the minority of Ferdinand IV. about the year 1760. See Colletti’s History of Naples, Horner’s Translation, I. 107.

[1587] Conc. Vatican. ann. 1870 Const. Dogmat. I. cap. iv. I use Cardinal Manning’s version.

[1588] Castillo y Mayone, II. 247, 254.—Panzini, pp. 358-63.—Alloc. Acerbissimum, 27 Sept. 1852.—Encyc. Incredibili afflictamur, 17 Sept. 1863.—Chavard, op. cit. p. 263.

[1589] Panzini, pp. 596-7.

[1590] Esaminatore, Firenze 15 Dic. 1867, p. 396.

[1591] Encyc. Neminem latet, 19 Mar. 1857.—Panzini, pp. 535-6.

[1592] Panzini, p. 123. An example of this is to be seen in the case of Saurin vs. Starr and Kennedy, which excited so much interest in England in 1869 by its curious revelations of the petty tyrannies and sordid miseries which sometimes at least form a feature of conventual life.

[1593] Yet, to meet the spiritual wants of all classes, there are still congregations which practise the most severe ascetic austerities. Thus, in 1883, a description of the Barefooted Clares in Paris shows that, out of eighteen members, but four are more than twenty-two years of age, the severity of discipline causing nearly all who enter to die young. No fire is allowed, even that in the kitchen being arranged to prevent access; sleep is only had on a narrow board, meat is only eaten on Christmas Day, and silence is enforced until some of the nuns lose the power of forming connected sentences.

[1594] The _Pères de la Foi_, also known as _Adorateurs de Jésus_ and _Paccanaristes_, were Jesuits in disguise; the _Société des Victimes de l’Amour de Dieu_ were Quietists. For the Report of M. Portalis, recommending their suppression, see Dutilleul, Hist. des Corporations Religieuses en France, Paris, 1846, pp. 411 sqq. For an exceedingly interesting sketch of modern French monachism, see also Ch. Sauvestre’s “Les Congrégations Religieuses” (Paris, 1867)—a work to which I desire to acknowledge my indebtedness for much that follows.

[1595] Décret du 18 Fév. 1809 Sect. II. Art. 8 (Dupin, Droit Ecclés. p. 295). This regulation, I believe, is still in force, and the members of these bodies are accustomed to renew their engagements every five years. From the position taken by Bishop Fabre, of Montreal, in April, 1883, in the case of a young woman who desired to leave her convent, I presume that the same regulation is in force in the Dominion of Canada.

[1596] For details, see Dupin, op. cit. pp. 285-298.

[1597] Chabot, Encyclopédie Monastique, p. xi. (Paris, 1827).

[1598] N. Y. Nation, May 29th, 1879. It is to the Paris correspondence of this journal that I am indebted for most of the details respecting the recent struggle between the religious orders and the state.

[1599] “Règle 91.—Qu’il ne laisse entrevoir aucune opinion, soit politique, soit théologique ou religieuse, contraire aux opinions du saint-siége.”—Sauvestre, op. cit. 215.

[1600] Le Pape et la Société Moderne, Paris, 1879, pp. 416-437.

[1601] Sauvestre, op. cit. pp. 123-4.

[1602] N. Y. Nation, April 21st, 1881.

[1603] Noli metuere ne omnes virgines fiant; difficilis res est virginitas, et ideo rara quia difficilis. Incipere plurimorum est, perseverare paucorum.—Hieron. adv. Jovin. I. 36.

[1604] Concil. Trident. Sess. XXIV. De Sacrament. Matrim. c. ix.

[1605] Concil. Trident. Sess. XXIII. De Reform. c. xii. The Abbé Chavard relates (Le Célibat des Prêtres, p. 269) that he once asked the directors of a seminary whether the age for assuming the burdens of the priesthood ought not to be postponed to the fortieth year, and he was told that the church must have priests and that there were few indeed who would submit to its conditions after the age of illusions was passed.

[1606] Souvenirs d’Enfance et de Jeunesse, Paris, 1883, p. 139. “Le fait est que ce qu’on dit des mœurs cléricales est, selon mon expérience, dénué de tout fondement. J’ai passé treize ans de ma vie entre les mains des prêtres, je n’ai pas vu l’ombre d’un scandale; je n’ai connu que de bons prêtres. La confession peut avoir, dans certains pays, de graves inconvénients. Je n’en ai pas vu une trace dans mon jeunesse ecclésiastique.”

[1607] Concil. Trident. Sess. XXV. De Reform. cap. xiv.

[1608] Convent. Episcc. Mediolanenss. ann. 1849 Sess. III. No. 18 (Collect. Lacens. VI. 717).—Concil. Roman. ann. 1725 Tit. XVI. c. iii. (Ib. I. 372).

[1609] For the varying legislation on this subject the reader may refer to C. Beneventan. ann. 1693 Tit. XVIII. c. iii. (Collect. Lacens. I. 44).—Synod. Bahiens. ann. 1707 Lib. III. (I. 854).—C. Tarracon. ann. 1717 c. XXXI. (I. 779).—C. Avenionens. ann. 1725 Tit. XXXVII. c. iii. (I. 554).—Synod. Firmanens. ann. 1726 Tit. IX. (I. 599).—C. Ebredunens. ann. 1727 c. v. No. 5 (I. 626).—Synod. Nat. Hungar. ann. 1822 De Discip. renov. 3 (V. 940).—C. Baltimor. IV. ann. 1840 Decr. X. (III. 72).—Conv. Episcc. Mediolan. ann. 1849 Sess. III. No. 18 (VI. 717).—C. Turon. ann. 1849 Decr. XI. i. (IV. 268-9).—C. Avenionens. ann. 1849 Tit. VI. c. v. No. 16 (IV. 348).—C. Remens. ann. 1849 Tit. XII. c. ii. (IV. 129).—C. Albiens. ann. 1850 Tit. I. Decr. v. No. 1 (IV. 411).—C. Burdigal. ann. 1850 T. IV. c. xii. No. 3 (IV. 588).—C. Bituricens. ann. 1850 Tit. VI. (IV. 1122).—C. Tolosan. ann. 1850 Tit. IV. c. iv. No. 126 (IV. 1069).—C. Senonens. ann. 1850 Tit. IV. c. iv. (IV. 904).—C. Aquens. ann. 1850 Tit. V. § 2. c. ix. No. 1 (IV. 985).—C. Rothomag. ann. 1850 Decr. XI. No. 3-5 (IV. 525).—C. Lugdunens. ann. 1850 Decr. XVIII. No. 1-3 (IV. 475).—Synod. Thurlesiens. ann. 1850 Decr. XVII. No. 14 (III. 785).—Conv. Epp. Lauretan. ann. 1850 Sect. I. v. (VI. 778).—Conv. Epp. Siciliæ Tit. II. c. i. No. 9 (VI. 815).—C. Auscitan. ann. 1851 Tit. IV. c. i. No. 147 (IV. 1200).—C. Quebecens. I. ann. 1851 Decr. XIV. (III. 615).—C. Westmonasteriens. I. ann. 1852 Decr. XXIV. No. 4 (III. 939).—C. Quebecens. II. ann. 1854 Decr. XIV. No. 20 (III. 652).—C. Armacens. ann. 1854 Decr. XXIII. (III. 852).—C. Portus Hispaniæ ann. 1854 Sect. II. No. 5 (III. 1100-1).—C. Ravennat. ann. 1855 P. IV. c. iv. No. 3 (VI. 198).—C. Seti. Ludovici II. ann. 1858 Decr. VII. (III. 318).—C. Viennens. ann. 1858 Tit. V. c. vi. (V. 197).—C. Strigonens. ann. 1858 Tit. VI. No. 9 (V. 53).—C. Venetic. ann. 1859 P. II. c. xvii. No. 10-11 (VI. 317).—C. Urbinatens. ann. 1859 P. II. Tit. vii. No. 148 (VI. 51).—C. Pragens. ann. 1860 Tit. I. c. vi. No. 1 (V. 426).—C. Coloniens. ann. 1860 Tit. II. c. xxxiv., xxxviii. (V. 378-80).—C. Cincinnatiens. III. ann. 1861 Decr. IX. (III. 226).—C. Coloniens. ann. 1863 Tit. IV. c. iv. (V. 670).—C. Quitens. ann. 1869 Decr. IV. No. 2 (VI. 403).—C. Ultrajectens. ann 1865 Tit. VIII. c. iv. (V. 905).—C. Pl. Baltimor. II. ann. 1866 Tit. III. c. vi. No. 164 (III. 446).—C. Halifaxiens. ann. 1868 Decr. XVIII. (III. 751).

[1610] De Sacerdotum Cœlibatu Doctrina Varsoviæ, 1801 pp. 62-3.

[1611] See previous note for warnings of this kind. The council of Ausch, in 1851, even ventures to allude to the grave inconveniences which may arise from the residence of a sister or aunt, if young, and if there is not also the mother or a female servant in the house.

[1612] Helsen, Avis à l’Archevêque de Malines, Monseigneur Sterckx, sur les abus du Célibat des Prêtres, 4to. Bruxelles, 1833.

[1613] Helsen, pp. 19-20.

[1614] Ibid. pp. 74-5.

[1615] Helsen, pp. 13, 16, 18, 100.

[1616] The comparative strength of the ecclesiastical militia is an important element in considering the condition of the church and its influence on the laity. I have already quoted statistics with regard to France, Belgium, and Austria, and will here append those for some of the other states and cities of Europe as given by Prof. von Schulte in his work on the Newer Catholic Orders (N. Y. Nation, Aug. 1st, 1872, p. 75).

Prussia, one ecclesiastic for every 584 Catholics, of all ages.

Bavaria, one for every 300 Catholics.

Germany at large, one for every 481.

Aix-la-Chapelle, one for every 110.

Cologne, one for every 313.

Münster, one for every 61.

Trèves, one for every 56.

Paderborn, one for every 33.

In the old Kingdom of Naples, by the census of 1842, there were 55,167 ecclesiastics in a population of 6,145,492, making a proportion of one to 112 (Penka, Uberior Cœlibatus Sacerdotalis Expositio, Cracoviæ, 1846).

[1617] In Italia libido non est probrosa.—P. Dens Theolog. No. 100 de jure et justitia. (ap. Helsen, p. 10). Dens died in 1775.

[1618] L’Esaminatore, Firenze, 15 Settemb. 1867.

[1619] Prota, Matrimonio Civile, Napoli, 1864, p. 44.

[1620] L’Esaminatore, 15 Oct. 1867.

[1621] Panzini, Pubblica Confessione, pp. 101, 357.

[1622] Report to the Italian Committee of the American Episcopal Church (The Episcopalian, Phila., Sept. 11th, 1867).

[1623] C. Baltimor. I. ann. 1829 Decr. XXV. (Collect. Lacens. III. 30-1).—C. Baltimor. V. ann. 1843 Decr. IX. (III. 90).—C. Australiens. I. ann. 1844 Decr. XII. (III. 1051).—C. Thurlesens. ann. 1850 Decr. XII. 41 (III. 782).—C. Rothomagens. ann. 1850 Decr. XVII. 3 (IV. 530).—C. Tolosan. ann. 1850 Tit. III. c. i. No. 70 (IV. 1054).—C. Casseliens. ann. 1853 Tit. III. (III. 837).—C. Tuamens. ann. 1854 Decr. VIII. (III. 860).—C. Quebecens. II. ann. 1854 Decr. IX. § 7 (III. 639).—C. Port. Hispaniæ ann. 1854 Art. IV. No. 1, 2 (III. 1098).—C. Halifaxiens. I. ann. 1857 Decr. XIV. (III. 745).—C. Viennens. ann. 1858 Tit. III. c. vii. (V. 169).—C. Coloniens. ann. 1860 Tit. II. c. XV. (V. 351).—C. Pragens. ann. 1860 Tit. IV. c. vii.; Tit. V. c. viii. (V. 508, 543).—Synod. Ultraject. ann. 1865 Tit. IV. c. viii. (V. 830).—C. Plen. Baltimor. II. ann. 1866 App. X. (III. 553).

[1624] Helsen, Abus du Celibat, p. 85.

[1625] C. Tuamens. ann. 1817 Decr. XVII. (Collect. Lacens. III. 765).—C. Australiens. I. ann. 1844 Decr. XII. (III. 1052-3).—C. Remens. ann. 1857 c. VI. No. 27 (IV. 211).

[1626] Instruct. S. Inquisit. Roman. Feb. 20, 1867, No. 7, 11-14 (Collect. Lacens. III. 553-6).

[1627] For an extract from a modern manual of the confessional “de agendi ratione confessarii erga conjugatos et conjugendos,” see Bouvet, De la Confession et du Célibat des Prêtres, Paris, 1845, pp. 290-6. It will be remembered what excitement was aroused in the British House of Commons a few years since, when a member produced and read a very much less objectionable form prepared for use by “Anglican priests.”

[1628] Bouvet, p. 516.

[1629] Lasteyrie, Hist. of Auricular Confession, II. 38-45.

[1630] Wahu, op. cit. p. 423.

[1631] Sauvestre, op. cit. p. 144. It is by this policy that the church renders itself responsible for the evil committed by its members. No human organization is without its share of the weak or vicious, and there is no lack of scandals in the Protestant denominations; but in these there is a wholesome jealousy which usually seeks at once to cast out and punish the offender. Thus, when, in July, 1867, the Rev. Mr. Wendt, at an orphan institution near Philadelphia, was discovered to be tampering with the virtue of the children under his charge, those who were most nearly connected with the management of the asylum were the first to take steps for his prosecution, and, as soon as the necessary legal proceedings could be had, he was undergoing a sentence of fifteen years’ solitary confinement, without a voice being raised in palliation of his crime.

[1632] Op. cit. pp. 138-44.

[1633] One result of this is that there is a large number of priests, summarily deprived by their bishops of the ministry, who seek the great cities to hide their poverty or find some miserable means of support. As all requests for dispensation to marry are refused, they mostly live in concubinage and their offspring go to swell the ranks of the dangerous classes. See Chavard, Le Célibat des Prêtres, pp. 542-48.

[1634] Wahu, op. cit. pp. 154-55.

[1635] Syllab. Dec. 1864 No. xix., xlii., liv., lv.

[1636] Clement. PP. VIII. Instruct. super aliquibus ritibus Græcorum, A. D. 1595, § V. No. 27.—Benedict. PP. XIV. Bull. Etsi Pastoralis, A.D. 1742, § VII. No. 16, 27, 28 (Concil. Collect. Lacens. II. 449, 517).