BOOK IV.
FROM THE
ELECTION OF GREGORY THE GREAT TO THE DEATH OF CHARLEMAGNE,
A.D. 590-814
CHAPTER IX.
SUPPLEMENTARY.
Influence of the Papacy.
The preceding chapters have set before us the changes
which took place in the position of the patriarchs during the seventh and
eighth centuries—the sees of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem reduced to
subjection under the Mahometan rule; the bishops of Constantinople becoming
more and more tools and slaves of the imperial court; while in the west the
power of the Roman bishop is greatly and rapidly increased. This advance of the
papacy was much aided by the circumstance that Rome, although often taken by barbarians,
never remained long in their possession. It alone retained its ancient
character, while in all other quarters the old national distinctions were
obliterated by successive invasions. The popes alone kept their ground amid the
revolutions of secular powers; and their authority was vastly extended as
nation after nation of the barbarian conquerors was brought within the sphere
of Christian influence. As in former times the bishop of Rome had been
considered by the Orientals to represent the whole western church, so he now
appeared to the new nations of the north and of the west as the representative
and source of Christianity on earth. St. Peter was regarded as holding the keys
of heaven, and as personally connected with his successors. The popes
strengthened their position at once by detaching themselves from the Byzantine
empire, and by entering into an alliance with the princes of the west on terms
such as the empire had never admitted.
They were connected by mutual interest with the
Frankish kings, especially with those of the second dynasty, and Charlemagne's
conquests gave them a supremacy over the church of northern Italy, which they
had in vain desired in the time of the Lombard princes. By the donations of
Pipin and of Charlemagne they acquired a new secular power; and it would seem
to have been in the latter half of the eighth century, or early in the ninth,
that the forged donation of Constantine appeared, to assert for them a more
venerable claim to a wider jurisdiction, and to incite the Frankish sovereigns
to imitate the bounty of the first Christian emperor. Constantine, it was said,
was baptized by Pope Sylvester, and at his baptism received the miraculous cure
of a leprosy with which he had been afflicted; whereupon, in consideration of
the superiority of ecclesiastical to secular dignity, he relinquished Rome to
the pope, conferred on him the right of wearing a golden crown with other
ensigns of sovereignty, and endowed the apostolic see with the Lateran palace,
and with all the provinces of Italy or the western regions. This forgery seemed
to justify the Romans in withdrawing themselves from the empire; it seemed to
legitimatize the possession of all that the popes had gained, since this was
but a part of what was said to have been bestowed on their see by the first
Christian emperor; and the fable retained its credit, although not altogether
unquestioned, throughout the middle ages.
The mission of Augustine introduced the papal
influence into England, where a new church arose, strongly attached to Rome,
and fruitful in missionaries who established the Roman ascendency in Germany
and in Gaul. The English church owned subjection to the pope, not so much on
account of his supposed succession to St. Peter, as because it derived its
origin from Rome, and thus was included in the Roman patriarchate by the same
principle which subjected the Abyssinians to the see of Alexandria. But as the
papal power increased elsewhere, the subjection of England to it became also
greater. The council of Cloveshoo, assembled by Ethelbald, king of Mercia, opened with the reading of two
letters from Zacharias, “the pontiff and apostolic lord, to be venerated
throughout the world”; and it is acknowledged that the recital of these
documents, in which he exhorts the English of every degree to reformation,
under the threat of an anathema, was in obedience to his “apostolical
authority”. In 785, two Roman legates— the first (as they said) who had been
sent into England since the time of Augustine—visited this country, and with a
view to the reformation of the church, councils were held in their presence in
Mercia and in Northumbria. Offa, king of Mercia, then the most powerful of the
English kingdoms, attended the Mercian assembly at Chalchythe. In consequence
of some offence which he had taken, on political or other grounds, at Janbert, archbishop of Canterbury, he wished that Lichfield
should be erected into an archiepiscopal see. Janbert strongly opposed a scheme by which his metropolitan authority was to be limited
to the kingdoms of Kent and Sussex; but it is supposed that the legates at
Chalchythe favoured the change, and with the sanction of Pope Adrian, Higbert, who had been bishop since 779, received the title
of archbishop. Some years later, however, Kenulph,
the second successor of Offa, having annexed Kent to Mercia, and being desirous
to conciliate the clergy of his new territory, joined with Athelard, archbishop
of Canterbury, in a request that Leo would again reduce the see of Lichfield to
its original condition. Athelard went to Rome in order to press the suit; the
pope consented, and with his license the new archbishopric was abolished by a
council held at Cloveshoo in 803.
Ina, king of Wessex, in 725 resigned his crown, and
went on pilgrimage to Rome, where he ended his days as a monk; and his example
was followed by other Anglo-Saxon sovereigns. It has been said that the tribute
of a penny from every hearth in England, afterwards known as Romescot or Peterpence, was first
granted by Ina, and was confirmed by Offa in 794. But it would seem that the
donation of Ina is imaginary, and that in the case of Offa a payment of 365
marks towards the lighting of St Peter's and the relief of pilgrims—an
eleemosynary grant from the crown—has been confounded with the Romescot of a later time, which was a tax levied on the
subject, and was interpreted by the advocates of the papacy as an
acknowledgment that this island was held in fee under the successors of St.
Peter.
Relations of Church and State.
The right of confirming elections to the papacy had
been exercised by the Byzantine emperors, either personally or through their
representatives, the exarchs, from the reconquest of Italy under Justinian
until the iconoclastic disputes led to the omission of the form in the case of
Zacharias; and the Carolingian emperors assumed the same privilege as a part of
their sovereignty. The story that, during Charlemagne's visit to Rome in 774,
Adrian, with a synod of a hundred and fifty-three bishops, bestowed on him and
his successors the right of nominating the popes, is now rejected, and, with
other such inventions, is supposed to have originated in later times from
the wish of the Roman party to represent the superintendence which the Frank
princes undeniably exercised over ecclesiastical affairs as if it were derived
from the gift of the popes.
In the East, where no political power was
attached to the episcopal office, the emperors had not usually interfered in
the appointment of bishops, except at Constantinople and other cities in which
they themselves resided. The second council of Nicaea enacted that bishops
should be chosen by their episcopal brethren, and that any nomination by
princes should be invalid. But in the new states of the west, the position of
the bishops as great landowners, and the political importance which they acquired,
occasioned a remarkable mixture of secular and spiritual things. Although it
was again and again laid down by Frankish councils that the elections of
bishops should be free, without any other condition than the approbation of the
sovereign, the usual practice throughout the period appears to have been that
bishops were appointed by the crown, whether the nomination were or were not
followed by a formal election on the part of the clergy and people. In 614 a
synod at Paris enacted that a bishop should be appointed without any payment,
by the concurrence of the metropolitan and bishops of the province with the
clergy and people of the city. But Clotaire II, in ratifying the canons,
introduced considerable alterations in favour of the royal prerogative; among
them, he required that a bishop should be consecrated under a mandate from the
crown, and reserved to himself the power of naming a clerk from his household
to a vacant see, although he promised in so doing to have regard to the
learning and merit of the nominee. It has been supposed that Charlemagne, by a
capitulary of 803, professed to restore the ancient usage of election by the
clergy and people; but no such enactment was really issued until the reign of
Lewis the Pious, while it is certain that in the appointment of bishops the
great emperor practically followed the example of his predecessors, and that he
was imitated by his descendants.
In Spain, the fourth council of Toledo, in 633,
enacted that a bishop should be chosen by the clergy and people of his city,
and that the election should be approved by the metropolitan and synod of the
province. But at the twelfth council of the same place, in 681, the appointment
of bishops by the royal authority alone is mentioned as a matter of settled
custom. The process by which this change was effected is unknown.
In England, although Wihtred, king of Kent, in 696,
disclaimed the right of appointing bishops the royal authority influenced their
appointment, as they were chosen by the witenagemot of each state in the
presence of the king. And here, as in other countries, the influence of the
crown gradually became more absolute. From letters written by Alcuin, a century
after Wihtred’s time, on a vacancy in the archbishopric of York, it appears
that the ancient freedom of election was then giving way; that kings assumed an
increased control over the choice of bishops, or even disposed of sees by gift.
In the ninth century, the nomination of bishops had passed into the hands of
the sovereign, while a shadow of the earlier system was kept up in a formal
election of the person so appointed, and in the publication of his name from
the pulpit of the cathedral, to which announcement the people replied by
acclamations and wishes of long life to their new pastor.
The Frankish sovereigns, in their continual movements,
required a staff of clergy to attend on them for the performance of divine
service. At the head of this body was placed the arch-chaplain, whose office
became one of great importance. Sometimes it was filled by a presbyter,
sometimes by a bishop, who in such a case required a special dispensation for
absence from his diocese; but, whether bishop or presbyter, the arch-chaplain
stood next in dignity to the family of the sovereign, and at synods he took
precedence even of archbishops. Combining the functions of chancellor with
those of chaplain, he acted as a minister of the crown for spiritual affairs;
he received reports from the bishops as to the state of their churches,
prepared the king's ecclesiastical capitularies and other documents, and
conducted his correspondence on matters which concerned the church. Such being
the arch-chaplain’s position, it depended on individual character whether he
should sway the prince in the interest of the hierarchy, or the prince should
by means of him obtain a control over the administration of the church.
The mixture of clergy and laity in the Frankish
councils has been already mentioned. The capitularies bear a marked impress of
clerical influence; but it was often possible for sovereigns, by the help of
their lay vassals, to overrule the proposals of the bishops as to
ecclesiastical affairs, or to carry measures notwithstanding their opposition.
Sometimes, however, the clergy were assembled by themselves, as at Verne or
Verneuil, in 755, where abbots for the first time appear as members of a
Frankish council.
In Spain, from the time when king Recared and his
nobles appeared at Toledo, for the purpose of arranging the change from
Arianism to the catholic faith (A.D. 589), mixed councils of clergy and laity,
summoned by the sovereign, were frequently held. At the earlier sessions of
these, from the seventeenth council of Toledo, in 694, the affairs of the
church were first discussed by the bishops and abbots, without the presence of
the laity; but on the fourth day, the nobles, the judges, and others, were called
in to take a part in their deliberations.
Among the Anglo-Saxons, the kings and other laymen
attended ecclesiastical synods, while the bishops sat in the witenagemots, or
national assemblies. The part which the laity took, however, in councils, did
not extend to matters purely spiritual, although it was for the witenagemot to
confirm, by the authority of law, the decisions of the clergy in such matters.
Bishops took precedence of the lay nobility; and sometimes the archbishops
signed the acts of synods before the king himself, as was the case at
Chalchythe in 785.
The claims of the ecclesiastical and secular
judicatures in France were variously settled by successive enactments. It may
be said in general, that, while the clergy were not amenable to secular
judgment in questions between members of their own order, or in the case of
ecclesiastical offences, the trial of questions between clerks and laymen
belonged to a mixed tribunal of lay and spiritual judges. Priests and deacons
were in no case to be tried except with the bishop's knowledge or co-operation;
and in important criminal charges, this privilege was extended to the lower
clergy. The principle of mixed tribunals was approved by Charlemagne; and
although he seems to have in some of his laws exempted the clergy from all
secular judgment in questions which concerned their own persons, this exemption
was far short of that for which the high hierarchical party contended at a
later time. For in cases which related to the possessions of clergymen, the
secular judges still had a share the right of judicature was not regarded as
inherent in the episcopal office, but as granted, and therefore revocable, by
the sovereign, so that in the ninth century bishops are threatened with the
loss of it if they neglect to exercise it rightly; and from metropolitans, as
from secular judges, the appeal lay to the emperor, beyond whom there was no
appeal. Among the Franks, as formerly under the Roman empire, there were many
canons to prohibit clerks from carrying their grievances to the sovereign
without abiding the judgment of their immediate superiors, or obtaining the
leave of these Clotaire II, in his edict of 614, ordered that no such recourse
to the king should be allowed, except in order to sue for pardon; but the royal
letter of pardon was a protection against all punishment, and the bishops were
bound to obey it.
In Spain, canons are found which forbid ecclesiastics
to judge in cases of blood, or to inflict mutilation of the members.
In England, the judgment of clerks was as yet on the
same footing with that of the laity. But this was before a mixed tribunal—the
bishop sitting in the county-court with the ealdorman or earl, as the priests
of the old Saxon heathenism had done; and the papal legates at the council of
Chalchythe objected to the custom, as tending to implicate the bishops too much
in worldly affairs. Notwithstanding their remonstrance, however, the practical
usefulness of the system secured its continuance, until the spiritual
jurisdiction was separated from the secular by William the Conqueror, at the
instance of his Norman ecclesiastical advisers.
The Hierarchy.—Administration of the Church.
The metropolitan organization had originally grown out
of an analogy with the civil divisions of the Roman empire. In the Frankish
kingdom, where no such division existed, the system fell into decay, and
although Boniface, under the authority of Pope Zacharias and with the
countenance of Pipin and Carloman, attempted to restore it, his success was
very imperfect. Charlemagne, when at Rome in 774, was urged by Adrian to
undertake the revival of the metropolitan jurisdiction and established it not
only in his original dominions, but in those which he acquired. But the new
metropolitans had not the same influence as those of earlier times. In the
national assemblies the metropolitan met the suffragan bishops as his peers,
and a suffragan might by character or ability become more important than his
ecclesiastical superior; while the growing connexion between France and Rome,
and the increase of the papal power, drew the Frankish clergy to look beyond
their metropolitans to the yet higher authority of the popes.
In the eighth and ninth centuries we find frequent
mention of Chorepiscopi—a title which in this period has some variety of
application. Of those who were subject to the diocesan bishops, some had
episcopal consecration, while the greater number were merely presbyters,
enjoying a delegated authority in rural places. But besides these, there are
frequent denunciations of chorepiscopi who were in the habit of wandering
about, without any local authority, and of interfering with the rights of the
established bishops by conferring orders and performing other episcopal acts.
The chorepiscopi of this class who disturbed the Frankish church were for the
most part from Ireland, where the peculiar system of the church encouraged the
multiplication of bishops without local jurisdiction; while others may have
been consecrated by chorepiscopi who had themselves received consecration as
assistants to the diocesan bishops. But even when the original appointment and
consecration were regular, chorepiscopi were often disposed to presume beyond
their proper function. Charlemagne, in a letter, states that the proceedings of
these persons had caused great trouble and scandal; that priests, deacons, and
sub-deacons, who had been ordained by bishops, denied the validity of orders
conferred by chorepiscopi; and that Pope Leo had disallowed the acts of these
intruders. They are (he continues) not really bishops, since they neither have
been consecrated by three bishops, nor possess episcopal titles to sees.
Ordination, confirmation, veiling of nuns, consecration of churches and of
altars, belong only to diocesan bishops —not to chorepiscopi or presbyters, who
correspond to the seventy disciples, and not to the apostles. The emperor says
that chorepiscopi had been made by bishops in ignorance of ecclesiastical
decrees, and from a wish to devolve their own labour on others; and he forbids
that any should be made in future. But in the following century we again meet
with notices of this class, most commonly in the way of censure, or of prohibition
from exceeding the limits of their commission.
Towards the end of the eighth century, the office of
archdeacon acquired a new character and importance. In earlier times, there had
been only one archdeacon in each diocese; but, with a view to a better
superintendence of the clergy, the dioceses of the Frankish empire were now
divided into archdeaconries, in which the archdeacons, although themselves of
a lower degree, had jurisdiction over presbyters, and exercised all the
ordinary administration except such acts as especially belonged to the
episcopal order. The office became so lucrative that laymen attempted to
intrude into it—an abuse which was forbidden by a capitulary of 805, and by
many canons of later date. As the archdeacons were not removable except for
some grave offence, it was soon found that many of them endeavoured to render
themselves independent of their bishops and from canons of the ninth century it
would appear that their exactions and the insolence of their followers were
severely felt by the clergy subject to their jurisdiction.
The archdeaconries of the new organization were
divided into deaneries (decania), each under an
archpriest or rural dean (archi-presbyter) The clergy
of each deanery met on the first of every month for conference on spiritual and
ecclesiastical affairs. The conference was followed by a dinner; but complaints
soon arose that these entertainments led to excesses which more than counterbalanced
the benefits of the meeting. Hincmar, archbishop of Reims, in his injunctions
of 852, found it necessary to denounce the abuse, and to lay down rules for
moderation, restricting the allowance of the clergy on such occasions to three
cups for each.
The bishops were required to visit throughout their
dioceses every year. The expense of entertaining them on their circuits was
often complained of by the clergy; with a view to limiting it, the seventh
council of Toledo ordered that the bishop should not on such occasions take
more than five (or, according to another reading, fifty) horses in his train,
and that his stay in each parish should not exceed one day. But even after this
limitation, the expense continued to be heavy, as appears from the list of provisions
required by a Lombard capitulary of 855, which includes a hundred loaves, four
large swine, a lamb, a pig, fifty pints of wine, and a sufficiency of honey,
oil, and wax. Lewis the Pious, in 829, charges his commissioners to inquire
whether the bishops in their visitations are burdensome to the clergy. A
capitulary of Charles the Bald, in 844, denounces the misbehaviour which was
common among the attendants of bishops when on visitation, and provides that
the clergy of five neighbouring parishes shall combine to supply provisions for
the usual hospitality to their diocesan. The priest at whose house the
entertainment is held is to contribute in the same proportion as the others,
with "perhaps" the addition of firewood and utensils. The third
council of Valence, in 855, censures an abuse which some bishops had introduced
by exacting visitation-dues of their clergy at times when they omitted to
visit.
The parochial system was not yet completely organized
in the Frankish church; the people in country places were often dependent for
divine offices on the clergy of the cathedral city, or on the chaplain of some
neighbouring castle. The division of England into parishes has (as we have
already seen) been ascribed to the Greek archbishop, Theodore; but, whatever
his share in promoting it may have been, the general establishment of the
system appears to have been slowly and gradually effected.
With a view of enforcing ecclesiastical discipline, it
was attempted by frequent enactments to bind the clergy by strict local ties.
No stranger was to be admitted to officiate without producing letters of
license and recommendation from his bishop. Fugitive clerks were to be examined
and sent home; wandering clergy or monks, who disturbed the church by teaching
error or by raising unnecessary questions, were to be apprehended, carried
before the metropolitan, and put to suitable penance; all the clergy of a
diocese were to be subject to the bishop’s jurisdiction. Presbyters were
obliged to remain in the diocese where they were ordained; some councils
required a promise that they would do so, and Charlemagne even imposed an oath
to that effect. No bishop was to receive a clerk from another diocese, or to
promote him to a higher degree; but, while this was absolutely forbidden in a
capitulary for France, the corresponding enactment for Lombardy allows it with
the consent of the bishop to whose diocese the clerk had belonged. And it is
evident, from facts which continually meet us in history and biography, that
with such consent it was not unusual for clergymen to pass from one diocese, or
even from one kingdom, to another.
During the earlier ages, ordination had not been
conferred without a title (i.e. without assigning a particular
sphere of labour), except in rare and extraordinary instances, such as that of
St. Jerome. The same rule was now often re-enacted; but an exception was
necessarily made in the case of missionaries, and was by degrees extended to
other cases. Although the ancient canons as to the requisites for ordination
were still in force, an important novelty was introduced, after the sixth
century, by means of the tonsure. This was regarded as conferring the character
of a clerk, without ordination to any particular grade of the ministry; and
thus clerks were made in great numbers, without any regard to the canonical
conditions or impediments of ordination. It may easily be conceived that much
disorder was introduced by these “acephalous” (or headless) clerks, who enjoyed
the immunities of the clerical state without being bound by its obligations.
The example of the royal household in France induced
persons of rank to establish domestic chaplains. These were often disposed to
set the bishops at defiance; and it appears from the testimony of many councils
that the institution had an unfavourable effect on the religion of the people
in general. It is represented that the absence of the lord from the
parish-church encourages his dependants to absent themselves; that
the clergy have no opportunity of enforcing the duties of the rich and powerful;
and there are frequent complaints of attempts to withdraw the ecclesiastical
dues from the bishops and parochial clergy, in order to provide for the
chaplains by means of them. But in addition to these evils, the chaplains were
usually persons of low and disreputable character; they were miserably paid,
disrespectfully treated by their employers, and required to perform degrading
services. The position and habits of chaplains were found to bring discredit on
the whole body of the clergy; and hence Agobard,
archbishop of Lyons, in the reign of Lewis the Pious, took occasion to write a
treatise in vindication of “the privilege and rights of the priesthood”. After
showing from Scripture the estimation in which the clergy ought to be held, he
proceeds by way of contrast to describe the abuses of his own time. Every
person of any pretension to station, he says, then kept a priest of his
own—“not to obey him, but continually to exact obedience from him, and that in
unlawful as well as in lawful things”. The chaplains were employed to do the
work of bailiffs, butlers, grooms, or dog-keepers, to wait at table, to lead
ladies’ horses. As no respectable clergyman would accept such a position, the
patrons, whose chief object was to obtain an excuse for deserting the public offices
of religion and emancipating themselves from the control of the clergy, cared
nothing how gross the ignorance of their chaplains might be, or how infamous
their lives. They usually took one of the serfs on their estates, or procured a
person of servile birth for the purpose, and were offended if the bishop
hesitated to ordain him as a matter of course. Even if we might implicitly
believe all that has lately been written against the English domestic chaplains
of the seventeenth century, it would appear that the class had lost nothing in
dignity between the age of Agobard and that of Eachard.
A new species of ecclesiastical officers arose in Gaul
during the sixth and seventh centuries, under the title of advocates, defensors, or vicedomini.
Except in name, these bore no resemblance to the defensors of
the earlier ages; the new office grew out of the peculiar circumstances of the
Frankish church. The bishops and clergy required the assistance of force to
protect them against the outrages of their rough and lawless neighbours. Their
landed possessions imposed on them duties which, if not altogether inconsistent
with their spiritual office, might, at least, be more conveniently performed by
laymen—such as the exercise of secular judicature, and the leading of the
contingents which their estates were required to furnish to the national army.
Moreover, as, by the Germanic laws, none but freemen, capable of bearing arms,
were entitled to appear in law-suits, the clergy (like women, old or infirm
persons, and children) required substitutes who might appear for them, and, if
necessary, might go through the ordeal of battle in their behalf. For such
purposes it was found expedient to call in the aid of some neighbouring layman,
distinguished by influence or by personal prowess; and his services were
usually recompensed by the use of lands belonging to the church, and adjacent
to his own, in addition to a share of the fines inflicted in his court, and to
other pecuniary dues. The appointment of an advocate was at first a voluntary
act; but Charlemagne ordered that every church should be provided with such a
champion. The qualifications for the office were very particularly defined,
with a view of guarding against misconduct or encroachment; and the advocates
were subject to the inspection of the imperial commissioners. The sovereign
assigned advocates to churches which were themselves unable to find any. As
such grants had the nature of a favour, the advocates thus appointed required
higher terms than those whom churches chose for themselves; and from them the
others gradually learnt to assume a superiority over the ecclesiastical bodies
with which they were connected, to claim dues which absorbed a large portion of
the revenues, and to become tyrants instead of protectors, both to the clergy
and to their tenants. It was not, however, until after the period which we are
now surveying that their relation to the church assumed this character.
Another encroachment on the church arose out of the
system of lay patronage, which had become general throughout the west. In some
cases, the right of presentation to a church expired with the founder, while in
others it was continued to his representatives. But patrons were not always
content with the power of nominating clerks. Sometimes the builder of a church
reserved to himself a certain portion of its revenues; sometimes the church was
built on speculation—the founder expecting to get more than a reimbursement
from the oblations, while he made a composition to pay the incumbent a certain
allowance. Against this practice canons were directed, which forbade bishops to
consecrate churches erected on such conditions; but the patron was considered
to have a legal interest in the preservation and right disposal of the property
belonging to his church. Charlemagne allows the sale of churches and Lewis
the Pious enacted that, if the incumbent of a church should have a surplus of
income, he should pay “due service” to his landlord. The division of
inheritance was some times carried into the disposal of church-patronage, so
that an “altar” might be divided into several portions, belonging to a like
number of priests; such partitions were forbidden by a capitulary of Lewis the
German, in 851.
A canon of the fourth council of Toledo provides that,
if the founder or benefactor of a church, or his descendants, fall into
poverty, an allowance shall be made to them out of its revenues.
The question of patronage was a fruitful source of
disagreements between bishops and secular lords. Canons were passed for the
purpose of guarding against abuses on both sides—enacting that no layman should
present or eject a clerk without the consent of the bishop, while, on the other
hand, the bishop was forbidden to reject a presentee except on good and valid grounds.
In the beginning of the period, we find many
denunciations of simony in the writings of Gregory the Great. He complains of
this “first of heresies”, this “buying and selling of doves in the
temple”, as prevailing in all quarters—in Gaul, in Germany, in Africa, in
Greece and Epirus, in the patriarchates of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem;
and he continually urges both princes and high ecclesiastics to join with him
in labouring to suppress it. But in defiance of all denunciations and
penalties, the evil continued, and from age to age there are frequent
complaints both against patrons who, for the sake of gifts, nominated worthless
persons to ecclesiastical office, and against bishops who corruptly
conferred ordinatio.
The Frankish church continued to increase in wealth.
Estates, sometimes of very great extent, were bestowed on it with the declared
object of securing for the giver the remission of his sins and the salvation of
his soul. And the inducements to make such donations were increased by
the system of precarious contracts—so called because the giver, in
endowing the church with his lands, prayed that the use of them might be
allowed him for his lifetime, or perhaps that it might be continued to one or
more persons in succession after him. Thus many who would have scrupled to
deprive themselves of the income arising from an estate, were enabled to
perform an act of bounty without expense to themselves, or even to make a
profit by it; for the church, in consideration of the reversion assured to
itself, in many cases allowed a donor to enjoy not only his own land, but other
lands of perhaps much greater value than that of which his gainful piety was to
deprive his heirs. With a view to the limitation of this abuse, it was enacted
by the council of Epernay in 846, that a donor of land should not be allowed to
receive more than twice the value of his gift by way of addition; that kings
should not sanction precarious contracts except at the request of the church ;
and that, agreeably to ancient custom, the contract should require renewal
every fifth year.
The lands of the church were either cultivated by its
serfs for the benefit of the owners, or they were let to tenants, whether free
or servile, who paid a fixed proportion of the produce by way of rent. In
addition to these lands and to the oblations, the ecclesiastical revenues were
now swelled by the general imposition of tithes. Under the old Roman system, a
tenth of the produce of land was paid by the coloni to
the state as rent; and when lands were granted on this condition to a
corporation, a second tenth—a ninth of the remaining produce—was paid by the
tenant to whom it was underlet. These two payments were known by the name of
“tenths and ninths”. The church, as a large holder of lands under the state,
exacted the ninths from its tenants; while sometimes, by special grant, it was
excused from the payment of the fiscal tenth, and consequently was entitled to
receive tenths as well as ninths for its own benefits.
The ecclesiastical or Levitical tithe was a third
charge, distinct from these rent-payments. The earliest canon which required
it, was passed by the council of Macon in 585. But it would seem that this
canon had little effect, and no attempt to reinforce it was made by the
Frankish councils during the remainder of the Merovingian period. Pipin for the
first time added the authority of the secular power to that of the church for
the exaction of tithes; but little was done until the reign of Charlemagne, who
by a capitulary of 779 enacted that they should be paid. The payment was
enforced, not only by excommunication, but by heavy civil penalties, graduated
according to the obstinacy of the delinquent and the obligation was extended to
the newly-acquired territories beyond the Rhine, where (as we have already
seen) it had the effect of exciting a strong prejudice against the Christian
faith. The council of Frankfort (A.D. 794) represents the opposition to tithes
as one of the offences by which a late scarcity had been provoked; devils, it
is said, had been seen devouring the hoarded corn of those who refused the
church its due, and voices had been heard in the air, uttering reproof of the
general sin. The tithe had at first been exacted only for corn. It was then
extended to other productions of the soil, such as flax and wine, and in some
places to the increase of animals. The enactments of Charlemagne’s time usually
speak of it as payable on the “whole property”; but it was long before the
clergy succeeded in establishing a general compliance with their claims in this
respect.
The capitulary of 829 forbids the receiver of tithe to
give the payers food, or any other consideration which might lead them to
suppose that the payment depended on their own will.
In England it appears that tithes were not enforced
until about the end of Bede’s lifetime. The mention of them in the so-called
“Excerptions of Egbert”, archbishop of York, is not to be relied on; but
Boniface, whose exertions contributed to the establishment of the impost among
the Franks and their dependents, is a witness for the payment of it in his
native country.
The abuse by which the Frankish princes granted the
beneficial use of church-lands to laymen had defied the efforts of Boniface,
and continued throughout the reign of Charlemagne. The holders of such
benefices were now required by canons to pay tenths and ninths to the church,
and also to repair, or contribute to repair, the churches which were situated
on their lands. But it would appear that great difficulty was found in
enforcing the canons against this powerful class; the council of Tours, in the
last year of the reign, states that complaints had often been made to the missi of their neglect to pay tenths and
ninths, but that such complaints met with no attention.
The disposal of the church's income was still in the
hands of the bishops; but in the new kingdoms of the west the deacons did not,
as such, take the same part in the administration of it by which their order
had become so important in the earlier ages. The steward, by whom the bishop
was assisted in this part of his administration, might be either a deacon or a
priest; his dignity was next to that of the bishop, and he had the guardianship
of the see when vacant. In some places the division of the funds was
quadripartite—one portion being assigned to the bishop and his household, one
to the rest of the clergy, one to the poor and strangers, and one to the fabric
and expenses of the church; in other places, it was tripartite—a third to the
bishop, one to the clergy, and one to the necessities of the church. The
tripartite division was known as the Spanish custom; the quadripartite, as the
Roman : and bishops are found announcing that, although entitled to the third
part which was prescribed by the canon of Toledo, they will be content with a
quarter, agreeably to the usage of Rome. The bishops were sometimes charged by
the inferior clergy with taking more than their due proportion, and from the
sixth century downwards canons were passed in order to restrain them from doing
so. Even where the full amount of the clergy’s share was fairly paid to them as
a body, the allowance of each individual still depended on the will of the
bishop, who thus had every clerk at his mercy. Where the tithe was paid in
kind, it is probable that some composition was agreed on between the local
clergy and the bishops, in order to avoid the inconveniences of removing it.
The council of Worms, in 829, ordered that bishops who had a sufficient income
from other property should relinquish their canonical share of the tithes for
the uses of the church and of the poor.
Capitularies were often passed to prevent the payers
of tithes from taking the disposal of them into their own hands, instead of
leaving it to the bishops; and from making the payment to some church which
private reasons might lead them to prefer, rather than to that church which was
rightfully entitled to it. In such cases, the missi were
to take care that proper restitution should be made.
There is some inconsistency in the enactments of
Spanish councils as to the dues which should be paid to the bishops. The second
council of Braga, in 572, forbids them to take the third part of
the oblations, and instead of it allows them only a yearly payment of two
solidi from each parish. The fourth council of Toledo, held in 633, under a
different government, in enacting that the bishop should not take more than a
third, makes no reference to the canon of Braga. But another council at Toledo,
in 646, re-enacts that canon; and one yet later, in 655, reverts to the system
of allowing the bishop a third. The exaction of two solidi afterwards found its
way into France; but there, in course of time, the bishops, instead of
acknowledging it as a substitute for the third part, required it as an
additional due, under the name of cathedraticum.
The burdens imposed on the clergy by the expenses of
the bishop’s visitation have already been mentioned. The new institution of
archdeacons, who claimed dues in right of their office, also contributed to
impoverish the parochial clergy.
The estates of the church in France, with
the exception of the parish-priest’s mansus or
glebe, were subject to the payment of all the ordinary taxes, unless exempted
by special privilege. The case was very different in England, where church-land
was exempt from all but what was styled the “threefold necessity”—the
obligation to contribute towards the national forces, the building of
fortresses, and the expenses of bridges and highways.
As in earlier ages, canons continued to be passed
forbidding the clergy to engage in secular employments.
In England, the mass-priests were required to learn
some handicraft, to practise it, and to teach it to their clerks; not, however,
with a view to their own gain, but in order that they might avoid the
temptations of idleness, and might have the means of relieving the poor. And
similar orders are found in France and elsewhere.
The high social position of ecclesiastics in the
Germanic kingdoms appears from the rates at which their lives were valued. The
payment known by the name of wehr, an
institution common to the whole German race, (but by no means limited to it),
was originally intended as a composition which should satisfy the relations of
a slain person for his life, and re-establish peace between them and the
slayer, so that the nation might not, on account of private enmities, be
deprived of the service of its members. The principle by which the female
relations of the slain man were excluded from any share of this payment—namely,
that they were not capable of carrying on a feud—might naturally have been
considered as extending to the clergy; but when these became a powerful order,
the church claimed a wehr for their
death. In France, the wehr of a
presbyter was equal to that of a count; the wehr of
a bishop, to that of a duke. In England an archbishop was rated in this respect
as equal to an atheling, or prince of the blood; a bishop, to an ealdorman, or
earl; a mass-priest, to a thane or lesser noble.
In days when the lay nobles were unable to read or
write, the possession of learning marked out ecclesiastics as the only persons
qualified for many important offices. The bishops, as men of counsel, got
precedence of the counts, the men of the sword. It was the policy of
Charlemagne to elevate the hierarchy by way of a counterpoise to the power of
his rude vassals. He orders that all shall pay obedience to the bishops, and
declares that those who refuse it shall have no home within the empire, “even
if they were his own sons”.
As the secular advantages of the clerical profession
became greater, it was sought by members of the dominant race, who had before
left it in the hands of the conquered. The occurrence of barbaric names among
the clergy from the seventh century indicates the time when Franks began to
enter into ecclesiastical orders; and very soon after, the effect of the change
is seen in the necessity of laws to restrain the clergy from secular habits and
occupations. Bishops led to the field the troops which their lands were
required to furnish towards the national army, and not only gave their personal
attendance (which was a matter of obligation, and might in some respects have
been beneficial), but engaged in bodily service. They were unwilling to admit
that their spiritual calling could deprive them of the birthright which
belonged to every free Frank, to share in the wars of his people; they wished,
too, by proving themselves men of action, to show that their property was not
to be invaded with impunity by their lay neighbours, and possibly to preserve
their estates from being applied by the sovereign to reward the military
services of other men. Boniface endeavoured to suppress such practices: it was
enacted that the clergy should not carry arms; that only so many of them should
accompany the army as might be requisite for the duties of chaplains, and that
these should confine themselves to their proper functions. But the reform seems
not to have lasted long ; Charlemagne renews the orders of his father’s
time, and exhorts the clergy, instead of bearing arms, to trust in God for
protection. A suspected document represents him as explaining that the object
of such enactments was not, as the bishops had supposed, to deprive them of
their honours. But even during the remaining years of his reign fresh
prohibitions were necessary; and when the strong hand of the great emperor was
removed, the warlike inclinations of the Frank bishops were displayed in a
greater degree than ever. In England also the clergy were disposed to bear
arms, as a right belonging to their free condition, and canons were passed to
check the practice.
While the Frankish laws restrained the pugnacity of
the clergy, care was also taken to prevent the owners of property from evading
the obligations attached to it under colour of ordination, or of the monastic
profession.
Thus we find an order in 799 that no noble should
receive the tonsure unless after an examination of his case before the bishop
of the diocese, and that if such a clerk should afterwards wish to reside on
his own land, he should perform the same military service as others.
With the. carrying of arms other secular habits and
amusements are forbidden to the clergy—as the keeping of hounds and hawks,
games of chance, noisy entertainments, worldly songs and instrumental music,
and the company of minstrels and buffoons.
The most remarkable regulations as to the marriage of
the clergy during this period belong to the east—being those of the Trullan council (A.D. 691). This council is strongly
opposed to second marriages. Presbyters who persist in such marriages are to be
deposed; if the second wife be dead, or if the husband separate from he, he
shall be allowed to hold his rank, but shall be excluded from priestly
functions. If a priest, a deacon, or a subdeacon marry a widow, he shall
separate from his wife, shall be suspended, and shall be incapable of higher
promotion. The council forbids, under pain of deposition, the practice of
African and Libyan bishops, who were reported to cohabit with their wives; the
wife of a bishop is ordered to separate from him, and to go into a convent. It
censures the practice of the Armenians, who required that the clergy should be
of priestly family, and allowed those who were so born to officiate as singers
and readers without receiving the tonsure; and it forbids the clergy to marry after
their ordination as subdeacons. But in its 13th canon, after stating that the
Roman church exacted of persons ordained as presbyters or deacons a promise to
abstain from their wives, the council expressly sanctions the contrary
practice, and grounds its sanction on the “apostolical canons”. No promise is
to be required, no separation is to be enforced; deposition is threatened
against any one who shall deprive priests, deacons, or subdeacons of their
wives, and against all members of these orders who under pretence of religion
shall forsake their partners. And, while the 29th canon allows the clergy of
“barbaric” churches to separate, if they think it their duty to do so, and if
their wives consent, the permission is declared to be granted only in condescension
to the narrow scrupulousness r which may be expected in such churches.
A council which in this and other points directly and
avowedly contradicted the principles and usages of Rome was not likely to find
favour with the popes, and as we have seen, it was rejected by Sergius I. But
the sanction which it gave to the marriage of the clergy has ever since
continued to regulate the discipline of the Greek church.
In the west, the period presents us with many
enactments against the marriage of the clergy. The Merovingian kings added
their authority to confirm the ecclesiastical canons which forbade it. But it
would seem that, notwithstanding the frequency of the prohibitions, many of the
clergy continued to marry—more especially where the authority of the popes was
not fully established, as in Lombardy, Spain, and some parts of Gaul and of
Germany. The see of Chur, in the Grisons, was hereditary in a family of bishops
who combined the powers of spiritual and civil government. The wife of one of
these, about the middle of the seventh century, in signing documents, styled
herself episcopa; and the marriage of the
bishops implies that the clergy were also at liberty to marry.
A question put by Augustine to Gregory the Great seems
to show that marriage had been usual among the British clergy. The law of the
Anglo-Saxon church on this subject was the same with that of Rome; but here too
there is frequent proof that the clergy continued to enter into the married
state; nor was their marriage annulled or the issue of it declared illegitimate
until the latter part of the twelfth century.
As in the earlier periods, the canons for the
enforcement of celibacy are accompanied by many which indicate the disastrous
effects of such measures. There are very frequent enactments as to the
entertainment of women in the houses of the clergy. The fourth council of
Toledo (A.D. 633) renews the orders of earlier Spanish councils that the
concubines of clerks shall be sold; the ninth council of the same place (A.D.
655) adds that their children shall be serfs of the church. Some canons forbid
the clergy to have as inmates of their houses even those nearest female
relatives who had been allowed by the council of Nicaea,—alleging by way of
reason that other persons had often been introduced under the pretence of
relationship, and that even the laws of nature had been violated. The councils
of Charlemagne’s reign in general, however, are content with renewing the
Nicene rule.
An important attempt at reform was made about the year
760 by the institution of the canonical life. The title of canons (canonici), which had formerly been given to all the
clergy, on account of their being enrolled in the canon or register of the
church, and entitled to maintenance from its funds, was now applied in a new
meaning, to designate clergy who lived under a canon or rule, resembling that
of the monastic communities. The idea of such an institution was not new; for
in earlier times Eusebius of Vercelli, Hilary of Arles, and the great Augustine
had shown the example of living together with their clergy; and more recently a
like practice had been usual in missionary bodies, where the bishop lived with
his staff of clergy and monks. But it was now reduced to a regular system by
Chrodegang, a nephew of Pipin, and archbishop of Metz.
Chrodegang’s scheme
was in great measure an adaptation of the Benedictine rule to the different
circumstances of the clergy. The bishop held a place corresponding to that of
the Benedictine abbot, the archdeacon answered to the provost or prior, the
seniors had the same oversight in both systems. Like Benedict, the father of
the canonical institute prescribed a common dwelling, an uniform dress, a
common table, a common dormitory, unless where the bishop should be pleased to
allow an exception. The clergy were required to attend certain services daily.
Every day they were to practise manual labour, and were to devote certain
portions of their time to study. The younger members of the society were to
show respect to the elders, as by rising and bowing when they passed, by asking
their benediction, and by standing in their presence, unless specially
permitted to sit down. All were to confess to the bishop in Lent, and again in
autumn; stripes or imprisonment were threatened as the penalties for going to
any other confessor. All who were not prevented by sin were to communicate
every Sunday and on other chief festivals. Articles of clothing were to be
supplied at stated times; the elders were then to give up the clothes which
they had worn, and these were to be transferred to the juniors. All were to
take their turns in the services of the house; each was in his order to cook
for a week, the archdeacon and the cellarer being the only exceptions. Laymen
were not to be admitted, except for some special purpose, such as that of
assisting in the kitchen and they were to leave the house as soon as their work
was done.
The dietary of the canons was more liberal than that
prescribed by the Benedictine rule. They were permitted to eat flesh, except
during penitential seasons. They had an allowance of wine (or of beer, if they
preferred it), graduated according to their rank—for priests and deacons, three
cups at dinner and two at supper; for subdeacons, two at each meal; for the
lower orders, two at dinner and one at supper. There were to be seven tables in
the hall, appropriated respectively to the bishop, to the various orders of
canons, to strangers, and to the clergy of the city, who on Sundays and other
festivals dined in the college, and partook of the instruction which was given
in the chapter-house. Edifying books were to be read at meals, and, in order
that they might be heard, silence was to be kept, “because it is necessary
that, when one taketh his bodily food, then also the soul should be refreshed
with spiritual food”.
The most important difference from the Benedictine
rule was, that the canons were allowed to enjoy individual property—whether
that which they had possessed before entering into the society, or such fees
and presents as they might receive for the performance of religious offices.
They were, however, obliged at their death to leave all to the brethren
From Metz the rule of Chrodegang soon made its way to
other cities. The number of its chapters was increased by additions from 34 to
86. Charlemagne even wished to reduce the whole of the clergy to this system;
and, although the attempt failed, and the great majority of the clergy
continued to live as seculars, many colleges of canons were formed under the
government of abbots, in addition to the cathedral bodies for which the scheme
had originally been intended. The rule was sanctioned for general use by a
great council at Aix-la-Chapelle under Lewis the Pious, in 816; and by the
middle of the ninth century it was established in almost all the cathedrals of
France, Germany, and Italy, and had also been adopted in England. The clergy
found their account in the apparent strictness of the new system, as a means of
recovering much of that popular admiration which the monks had long enjoyed to
the prejudice of the hierarchical orders; and in consequence of this
strictness, donations were largely bestowed on the canonical societies. The
cathedral chapters became wealthy and powerful, and soon began to assert a
claim to act as the bishop's advisers, and to share in the administration of
the diocese.
Monasticism
During these centuries the monks played an important
part in western Christendom. The missions to the Germanic nations were chiefly
their work; they planted colonies in lonely places, where towns soon grew up,
as at Fulda, St. Gall, Eichstedt, and Fritzlar; and
with the knowledge of religion they spread that of agriculture and civilization
among the people. Through the employment of monks in missionary labour,
ordination was more largely introduced into their ranks, as a necessary
qualification for missionary duties. In some cases, sees were usually filled
with monks from certain abbeys—an arrangement the more natural because learning
was chiefly cultivated in the monastic societies. Thus Strasburg received its
bishops from Munster in Alsace, Spires from Weissenburg, Constance from
Reichenau or St. Gall.
The reputation of sanctity continued to wait on the
monks. The term religion, which had been specially applied to the monastic
profession by a council at Orleans as early as 549, became more and more
restricted to it. Entrance on the monastic state was regarded as a second
baptism. The Penitential ascribed to Theodore of Canterbury curiously follows
out this idea by ordering that the novice shall for seven days have his head
covered with the cowl, as the head of the newly-baptized was covered with the chrism
or veil; and a like order, although with an abridgment of the time to three
days, was made under Lewis the Pious in 817. Persons of high rank flocked into
the cloisters; it was no unusual thing even for kings and queens to resign
their royalty and to assume the monastic habit.
During the earlier part of the period there was a
considerable variety of rules. That of St. Columban for a time appeared to
rival the Benedictine code in popularity. It became not uncommon to combine the
two; but by degrees the rule of St. Benedict triumphed, as being marked in a
greater degree by practical sense, less rigorous, and more elastic than the
others. With slight modifications in particular cases, it was commonly adopted
in France, where a great excitement in its favour was produced about the middle
of the eighth century by the alleged relics of the founder, which were said to
have been translated to Fleury on the Loire about a hundred years before, when
the parent monastery of Monte Cassino had been laid waste by the Lombards. In
England, too, where the Benedictine rule was introduced by Wilfrid, it soon
became general, although not without some mixture of the old national usages.
But the Spanish monasteries continued until the ninth century to be governed by
rules which had been compiled, partly from eastern sources, by Isidore of
Seville, Fructuosus of Braga, and other native bishops.
The monasteries in general continued to be subject to
the jurisdiction of their diocesan bishops; but exemptions, of which we have
already seen traces in the sixth century, now became more common, and the
authority of Gregory the Great had an important share in advancing the
practice. It would appear, however, that the reason of such exemptions in this
period is not to be sought in any ambition or assumption on the part of the
monks, but in the oppressive conduct of bishops. These from the seventh century
began to claim a share in the gifts bestowed on monasteries. They exacted
unreasonable payments from the monks for the dedication of their churches, for
the consecration of chrism, for ordaining their clergy and installing their
abbots. A large part of the revenues was absorbed by the expense of
visitations; and in addition to this, the bishops extorted heavy fees under the
names of cathedralicum and the like.
Where the choice of an abbot belonged to the monks, the bishops often
endeavoured to wrest it from them, and exercised it without any regard to the
welfare of the house, or to the pretensions of the more eminent members, who
might have reasonably expected to succeed to the headship. The grossness of the
tyranny practised by some prelates may be inferred from the fact that the
monastic bodies often appealed against it to synods, and that these, although
composed of bishops, felt themselves obliged to condemn it in strong terms, and
to forbid its continuance. In some cases during the eighth century, it was
provided that, if the diocesan bishop would not perform his functions with
respect to a monastery on reasonable terms, the abbot might apply to another.
On the whole, it may be said that the exemptions of this period were sought not
so much for the sake of emancipation from the rightful authority of the
bishops, as for relief from their rapacity. The bishop still retained his
general supervision of religion and morals in the exempt monasteries; he was
even entitled to inquire into the administration of the temporalities, while he
was restrained from acts of plunder and oppression.
When some monasteries had obtained such privileges, it
became usual with founders to insist that those which they established should
stand on a level with others in this respect. There were, too, certain
monasteries which were styled royal—either from having been founded by princes,
or from having obtained their special protection; and these were exempt from
all jurisdiction except that of the sovereign, which was exercised through
the missi and the bishops. Some
monastic houses, of more than ordinary dignity, had bishops of their own,
resident within their walls, as was the case at St. Denys. And in addition to
these, it appears that the popes had already commenced a practice of granting
exemption from all authority but their own. The first instance is commonly said
to have been a grant from Zacharias to the abbey of Fulda; but the genuineness
of the document is much questioned. If genuine, it was granted at the request
of Boniface himself, and therefore not with an intention to injure the rights
of the diocesan. But when the archbishopric and the abbacy which had been
united in the apostle of Germany were separated, the privileges conferred on
Fulda, and the renown which it acquired as the resting-place of his remains,
excited the jealousy of Lull, his successor in the see of Mayence.
The archbishop complained that the exemption wrongfully interfered with his
jurisdiction. He is said to have persecuted the abbot, Sturmi,
by unscrupulous means—even inducing Pipin, by a charge of treason, to banish
him for two years; and the enmity between the two continued to the end of the
abbot’s life, so that, on his death-bed, in declaring his forgiveness of all
men, he thought it necessary to mention Lull by name, as being the person who
most especially needed it.
Exemptions existed also in the patriarchate of
Constantinople, where some monasteries were discharged from the bishop’s
authority and subject to the metropolitan, while others were subject to the
patriarch only. In token of these privileges, the metropolitan or patriarchal
crosier was erected over the altar in the chapel of the monastery. The second
council of Nicaea allowed abbots, if they were presbyters, to ordain the lower
clergy of their monasteries. The rule was adopted in the west, and from this
and other circumstances it came to pass that the inmates of a monastery,
instead of being mostly laymen, as in earlier ages, now belonged, with very few
exceptions, to some grade of the hierarchy.
The age of admission to the monastic community was
variously fixed. The Trullan council lays down that
it ought not to be under ten. Theodore of Canterbury names fifteen as the age
for monks, and sixteen or seventeen for nuns. The capitularies of 789 re-enact
the old African canons which forbade the reception of women before the age of
twenty-five, unless for some special reason. But besides those who took the
vows on themselves, children might be devoted by their parents to the monastic
state; and in this case, as in the other, there was no release from its
obligations. Charlemagne, however, endeavoured to put some limit to the
practice, by ordering that, “saving the authority of the canons”, girls
should not be veiled until they were old enough to understand their engagement.
Many orders are found against the admission of serfs
into monasteries without the consent of their masters, and of freemen without
licence from the sovereign. It was not unusual to make a false profession of
withdrawing from the world, for the sake of escaping from military service. In
order to check this abuse, Charlemagne orders, in 805, that those who forsake
the world shall be obliged to live strictly according to rule, either as canons
or as monks.
Although the observance of the same rule was a bond of
union between monastic societies, no more intimate connexion was as yet
organized in the west. Some of the greater monasteries had cells or priories
dependent on them; but, except on this very limited scale, there was no
affiliation of one religious house to another, nor was there any subjection of
many to a common head, as had been the case in the system of St. Pachomius. It
was usual for an abbot, in sending forth one of his monks to found a new community,
to release him from the vow of obedience so soon as he should be able to
establish a footing. During the earlier part of the period, it was forbidden to
an abbot to have more than one monastery, although Gregory the Great allowed it
in some cases; but this rule was afterwards disregarded. Pluralities, both
ecclesiastical and monastic, became frequent, and sometimes both kinds were
held by the same person. Thus about the year 720, Hugh, a member of the
Carolingian family, was at once bishop of Paris, Rouen, and Bayeux, and abbot
of Fontenelle and Jumieges. In the instances where a
see was usually filled from a particular monastery, the bishops often united
the abbacy with their higher dignity; and where bishops were able to usurp the
power of nomination to an abbacy, they sometimes took the office for themselves.
In this manner Sidonius, bishop of Constance, who had already got possession of
the abbey of Reichenau, resolved in 759 to make himself master also of that of
St. Gall; and, although we are told by the monastic historians that his
rapacity was punished by a death like that of Arius, the next bishop, John, not
only engrossed the same rich preferment, but towards the end of his life formed
a scheme of providing for his three nephews by transferring the bishopric to
one of them, and an abbacy to each of the others.
Many of the monastic societies were specially exempted
by sovereigns from all public imposts and tolls. But such exemptions were as
often tokens of poverty on the part of the house as of extraordinary royal
favour. Thus in a list of the Frankish monasteries, drawn up at Aix-la-Chapelle
in 817, where they are ranged in three classes, as owing to the prince both
gifts and military service, as owing gifts only, or as free from all duty
except prayer, the most distinguished foundations are for the most part included
in the most heavily burdened class.
As monasteries grew rich, some evil consequences
followed. The vow of poverty was considered to be satisfied by the renunciation
of individual property. Where its obligation was felt as matter of conscience,
the monks retained their original simplicity of dress and food, while their
superfluous wealth was spent on other objects, such as the erection of costly
buildings. But very commonly the possession of the means of luxury introduced
the enjoyment of it. In the east, the confessor Maximus, in the middle of the
seventh century, denounces the disorderly lives of monks, and says that their
profession of piety was no better than hypocrisy. Charlemagne in 811 censures
the abbots as caring only to swell the numbers of their monks, and to obtain
good chanters and readers, without any solicitude as to their morals. He
sarcastically asks how the monks and clergy understand the text against
entangling themselves with the affairs of this life; whether they suppose the
only difference between themselves and secular men to consist in their being
unmarried and carrying no arms; whether those can be said to have forsaken the
world who are incessantly striving to increase their possessions by all sorts
of means—who use the hopes of heaven and the terrors of hell, the names of God
and the saints, to extort gifts not only from the rich but from the poor and
ignorant, and by diverting property from the lawful heirs drive many to theft
and robbery. How, he continues, can they be said to have forsaken the world who
suborn perjury in order to acquire what they covet? or those who retain their
secular property, and are surrounded by bands of armed men?
Abbots, as well as bishops, were addicted to war, to
hunting and hawking, to games of chance, to the company of minstrels and
jesters. There are many ordinances against irregularities of this kind—some of
them extending to abbesses also; and there are frequent complaints of gross
immorality among recluses of both sexes, with attempts to restrain such
practices.
The wealth of monasteries, like that of churches,
suffered from the exactions of their advocates, and from alienation to laymen.
A remarkable instance of such alienation is recorded as to the abbey of Stablo, in the diocese of Liege, where, in consequence of
the conversion of the revenues into a lay “benefice”, there were two
successions of abbots, the one line being generally made up of the bishops of
Liege, while the other consisted of powerful laymen.
Towards the end of the period, a remarkable reformer
of the monastic life appeared in France. Witiza,
afterwards known as St. Benedict of Aniane, was of
Gothic descent, and son of the count of Maguelone in Septimania.
When a boy, he was placed in the court of Pipin, to whom he became cupbearer,
and he continued in the service of Charlemagne. In 774 he accompanied his
master to Rome; and on his way homeward he narrowly escaped from drowning in a
vain attempt to save his brother, who had rashly plunged into a swollen ford.
In gratitude for this preservation, he carried out a thought which he had
already for some time entertained, of embracing a monastic life, by entering
the monastery of St. Seine, in Burgundy. Although he had assumed the name of
Benedict, the rule of the Nursian monk appeared to
him fit only for weak beginners and he rushed into the austerities of eastern
monachism. He macerated his body by excessive fasting; his dress was of rags,
swarming with vermin, and patched with a variety of colours; he took very
little sleep, and that on the bare ground; he never bathed; he courted derision
and insult as a madman, and often expressed his fear of hell in piteous
outcries; and, although his abbot repeatedly urged him to relent from these
severities, Benedict's resolution was inflexible
On the death of the abbot, Benedict was chosen as his
successor; but he fled from St. Seine, and built himself a little hermitage on
his father's estate, by the bank of the river Aniane.
Some monks who attempted to live with him, found themselves unable to support
the excessive severity of his system; but in course of time a considerable
society was gathered around him, and a monastery was erected near his cell.
Benedict himself took part in the building of it; he and his monks were obliged
to carry the materials, as they were unable to provide oxen for the work. The
walls were of wood; the roof was thatched with straw the vestments for divine
service were coarse, whereas silk was usually employed for such purposes; the
eucharistic vessels were of wood, afterwards of glass, and finally of pewter.
The monks lived chiefly on bread and water, varied sometimes by milk, and on
Sundays and holydays by a scanty allowance of wine. If the rigid simplicity of
Benedict’s first arrangements was partly dictated by fear lest richness of
architecture and of ornament should prove injurious to monastic discipline, he
must afterwards have changed his opinion on the subject; for in 782 the humble
wooden buildings made way for a splendid monastery. The church was adorned with
marble pillars; there were several costly chapels; and all that belonged to the
furniture and to the services was of unusual magnificence. Charlemagne, who had
contributed to the expense, exempted the monastery from all taxes, and from the
jurisdiction both of bishops and of counts.
Benedict became a man of great note and influence. His
name has already come before us, as one of the commissioners employed by
Charlemagne to reclaim the adherents of Felix of Urgel;
Lewis the Pious, while king of Aquitaine, employed him to reform the
monasteries of that country; and the effect of his institutions was widely
felt. He collected into two books the monastic rules of the east and of
the west; in a third book he added the rules for nunneries; and from the whole
he composed a “Harmony of the Rules”, in which the precepts of the earlier St.
Benedict on every subject are illustrated by those of other monastic
legislators. In his reforms he was content to enforce the Benedictine system,
which experience had shown him to be better suited for general use than the
rigours of oriental monachism. In his own practice, he was obliged to abate
somewhat of the violence with which he had begun; but his life continued to be
strictly ascetic, and he shared with his monks in the labours of ploughing,
digging, and reaping. Soon after the accession of Lewis to the empire, Benedict
resigned the abbacy of Aniane, and removed to a new
royal foundation on the bank of the Inda, near Aix-la-Chapelle; and, after
having played an important part during the earlier years of his patron’s reign,
he died at the age of seventy, in 821.
In England, monachism fell into decay from the earlier
part of the eighth century. The monasteries were often invaded and occupied by
secular persons, and although a canon of Cloveshoo was directed against this evil, the terms which are used significantly prove
that the council had little hope of being able to suppress it. Boniface in
his letters to Archbishop Cuthbert, and to Ethelbert. king of Mercia, complains
that the English monasteries are oppressed beyond any others in Christendom;
that their privileges are violated, that they are heavily and unjustly taxed,
that they are ruined by the expense of entertaining the king and his hunting
train; that the monks are forced to labour at the royal buildings and other
works.
But much blame is also laid on the communities
themselves. The monks are often charged with riotous living and with
drunkenness, which Boniface describes as a peculiarly national vice; and the
fondness for gay clothing, which was another characteristic of the English,
defied all monastic rules. Aldhelm strongly reproves the indulgence of this
taste. Boniface complains of it to Cuthbert; the council of Cloveshoo censures it in clergy, in monks, and in nuns, denouncing especially in men the
affectation of a laical headdress, and the fashion of
adorning the legs with fillets of various colours; the council of Chalchythe
desires monks and canons to use the same habit with those of the continent, and
not dyed with Indian dye, or very costly. But some years later Alcuin is found
continuing the complaint against such vanities; and the love of them was not to
be overcome.
In addition to the causes which have been mentioned
—the secular oppression to which the monks were subjected, and their own
unwillingness, when the first period of fervour had passed away, to bear the
restraints of the monastic rule—the introduction of the canonical life
contributed to the decline of English monachism. The occupants of religious
houses became canons instead of monks; and about the middle of the ninth
century the Benedictine order was almost extinct in England.
The regulations of this period as to female recluses
correspond in general character with those for monks. Abbesses are required to
be subject to their bishops; they are censured for interfering with the
sacerdotal function by presuming to veil virgins, and to give benedictions and
imposition of hands to men—apparently by way of ordination to the lower grades
of the ministry. There are frequent complaints of dissolute life in nunneries,
and the abbesses themselves are sometimes charged with a share of the guilt.
Other canons are directed against the practice of allowing widows to take the
veil during the first agitation of their bereavement, as it had been found that
such nuns often relapsed into worldly business or gaieties, and endeavoured to
secure at once the privileges of the monastic and of the secular life.
The Benedictine rule was adapted to the use of female
societies; and towards the end of the period the example of Chrodegang's rule led to the institution of canonesses, who lived together under a less
rigid code than nuns, and without being obliged to give up their private
property.
Rites and Usages.
Throughout the west, Latin had from the first been
used as the language of divine service. As it was spoken in all the western
provinces of the empire, there was no necessity for translating the liturgy
into other tongues; and after the barbarian conquests Latin remained as the
language of superior civilization, and especially as that of the clergy, whose
ranks were for a long time generally filled from among the Romanized
inhabitants. It was the medium by which nations carried on their official
intercourse; it alone remained stable, while the dialects of the invaders were
in a course of fluctuation and change; and where new languages were formed on
its basis—a process in which the ecclesiastical use of the Latin contributed
greatly to secure its predominance—the formation was gradual, so that it would
have been impossible to fix on any time at which the ancient Roman tongue
should have been disused as obsolete. The closer connexion established with
Rome by Pipin and Charlemagne confirmed the use of Latin in the Frankish
church. And thus an usage which originally arose out of circumstances, came at
length to be regarded as necessary, and at a later time to be justified by
theoretical argument, although confessedly as contrary to the practice of the
early church n as it appears to be to reason. Charlemagne, however,
notwithstanding his attachment to the Roman ritual, combated the growing
opinion on this point. “Let no one”, it is said in his capitulary at the
council of Frankfort, “suppose that God may not be prayed to except in three
languages; forasmuch as in every tongue God is worshipped, and man is heard if
he ask the things which are right”.”
The chanting was now left to the choir, and the people
joined only in the Kyrie eleison. But Charlemagne and others were
careful that preaching—which by means of missions regained an importance which
it had once appeared likely to lose—should be frequent, and in the vulgar
tongue. His measures for the instruction of the people in the creed and in the
Lord's prayer have been noticed in a former chapter.
In England, Latin was employed as the ritual language,
not only by Augustine and his followers, but by the Scottish and Irish
teachers, who had been accustomed to it in their native churches. The epistle
and gospel, however, were read in the vernacular tongue, and in it sermons were
delivered. The Scottish or Irish liturgy was suppressed by the council of Cloveshoo in those parts of southern England where it had
before been used; but, notwithstanding the influence of Wilfrid, it kept
possession of the church of York until the time of Alcuin, who is found
recommending that it should be abandoned. It would, however, seem that, in the
adaptation of the Roman ritual for England, some use was made of that license
of selection from other formularies which had been granted by Gregory to
Augustine.
In the east, Greek had been the usual language of the
church, and continued to be so under the Mahometan rule, where Arabic was used
for the ordinary business of life. The monophysites of Egypt, however, employed the Coptic in their service, and the Nestorians the
Syriac.
The use of organs was now brought into the service of
the Latin church. The earliest mention of such instruments (as distinguished
from the ancient hydraulic organ, of which the invention is by some ascribed to Archimedesa) is perhaps in a passage of St.
Augustine. Venantius Fortunatus, bishop of Poitiers about the year 600,
compares the voices of boys and men in a choir to the smaller and the larger
pipes of an organ respectively, but does not speak of the instrument itself as
used in churches; so that his words are not inconsistent with the opinion which
ascribes the introduction of organs into churches to Pope Vitalian (A.D.
65 7-672) . It appears from the testimony of Aldhelm that they were known in
England at the beginning of the eighth century; but it would seem that, after
the age of Venantius, the organ had again become a novelty to the Franks when
one was sent by Constantine Copronymus as a present to Pipin in 757. The St.
Gall biographer of Charlemagne tells us that a similar instrument, “emulating at
once the roar of thunder and the sweetness of the lyre”, which was brought by
some Greek ambassadors to the great emperor, excited the imitative talent of
the Franks. Under Lewis the Pious, a Venetian priest named George was employed
by the emperor to build an organ at Aix-la-Chapelle, and is said to have
performed his task “with marvellous skill”; but it would seem that the
instrument was of the hydraulic kind. So skillful, however, did the Franks become in
the manufacture of organs, that about a century after the date of Constantine’s
gift to Pipin, Pope John VIII is found requesting a bishop of Freising to send
him one, with a person skilful in the use of it, because the organs of the
north were superior to any that could be made in Italy. Some of the great
organs of those days must have been very formidable instruments, if we may take
literally the poetical description of one which was erected in Winchester
cathedral by Bishop Alphege (afterwards archbishop of Canterbury), in the end
of the tenth century; for it is said to have been blown by twenty-six pairs of
bellows, which required the hard labour of seventy men to work them.
To this period also is ascribed the introduction of
church bells. The belief which was long current, that they were invented by St.
Paulinus of Nola in the end of the fourth century, is without historical
support, and rests only on a mistaken etymology. According to some writers,
they were first used in churches by Sabinian, the successor of Gregory the
Great in the see of Rome; but in any case it is certain that in the course of
the seventh and eighth centuries the use of them spread widely throughout France
and other countries. Bells are familiarly mentioned by Bede, and in St.
Boniface’s letters. Under Charlemagne, we find the legendary St. Gall
biographer relating that a monk of his own community, named Tancho,
having received a commission from the emperor for a great bell, substituted tin
for silver in the composition of the metal, and was punished for his fraud by a
miraculous death; and in the capitulary of 789 there is a prohibition of the
baptism of bells—a superstition which was afterwards carried further, by
conferring baptismal names on them, and furnishing them with sponsors.
The history of the eucharistic doctrine during this
period has been disputed with as much zeal and partiality as if the question
between modern Rome and its opponents depended on the opinions of the seventh
and eighth centuries. The word figure, when it occurs, is hailed by one party,
and such words as body, blood, or changed, by the other, as if they were
sufficient to determine the matter. But the truth seems to lie between the
extremes. Both in language and in opinion there was a progress towards the doctrine
of transubstantiation, and the feeling of individuals may have closely bordered
on it; but there was no acknowledgment, nor apparently even any assertion, of
more than an effective grace, by which the consecrated elements, while
retaining their original substance, convey to the faithful receiver the
benefits of the Saviour’s death. Some passages of Bede and of Alcuin, for
example, which are produced by Romanists as favourable to their views, appear
really to maintain nothing beyond the doctrine of the English Reformation.
Thus, when Alcuin speaks of a bishop as consecrating bread and wine into the
substance of our Lord's body and blood, it would seem that by “substance” he
does not mean anything material; that he does not even use the word in the scholastic
sense, as denoting that by which a thing is what it is, but that he intends
only a virtual efficacy. And after this, the Caroline Books, in which Alcuin
himself is supposed to have been largely concerned, express themselves in a
manner entirely accordant with our own eucharistic doctrine.
John of Damascus appears to have gone further than any
of the western teachers. He rejects the term “figure”, as unauthorized by
Scripture, and declares the consecrated elements to be “the very deified body
of the Lord”. Yet the sense of this startling expression may be reduced by a
comparison with the language then current as to the union of our Lord’s natures
or wills—where it was said that the flesh or the human will was “deified” by
its connexion with the Godhead. If the meaning were more than this parallel
would warrant—if John intended to maintain that the material elements were
changed, instead of being united with something higher—it is certain that the
eastern church did not adopt his view. The Eucharist was mentioned in the
controversy as to images by the hostile synods of Constantinople and Nicaea.
The iconoclastic assembly declares that the only true image of the Saviour is
the Eucharist—meaning that the union of the Divine grace with the earthly
elements represents that union of Godhead and manhood in his person which
images failed to convey, inasmuch as they could only set forth the humanity. The
Nicene council, in answering this, finds fault with the term image, as being
one which no father had applied to that which is His body and blood. Yet no
objection is made to the substance of the comparison; nor do we find anywhere
in this controversy the distinction which must have occurred if the modern
Roman doctrine as to the sacrament had been then received—that the consecrated
elements are unlike images, forasmuch as they are not a representation, but are
really Christ Himself.
Instead of the common bread in which
the Eucharist had originally been administered, wafers were now
substituted in the west. They were of very fine flour unleavened, round in
shape, and stamped with an instrument. The communion of infants appears to have
been still in use, and many superstitions were practised with the consecrated
bread—such as giving it to the dead and burying it with them. The cup continued
until the twelfth century to be administered to all communicants
The height to which the idea of a sacrifice in
the Eucharist was carried (an idea which appears in the earliest ages of
the church, although with some indefiniteness of meaning), now led to some
important consequences. The sacrifice was supposed to avail not only for those
who were present but for the absent; for the dead as well as for the living.
One result of this was, that the obligation of receiving the sacrament was less
felt, so that there is much complaint as to the rarity of communion, and that
canons are passed for restoring the three receptions yearly which had been
prescribed by the council of Agde. At length masses
came to be celebrated privately, and by the priest alone. This practice was
forbidden by Theodulf of Orleans; it is censured, although not in absolute
terms, by the council of Mentz in 813, is more decidedly condemned by the sixth
council of Paris, in 829, and in the following century is again forbidden by
Atto, bishop of Vercelli.
From the time of Gregory the Great, the doctrine of
Purgatory spread and was developed. In the English church, the offspring of
Gregory’s own exertions, it appears to have especially taken root. Bede relates
stories of persons who had been transported in vision to the regions of the
dead; they returned to consciousness with a sad and awestruck air, told their
tale, and soon after died. Thus Fursey and Drithelm were permitted to see the punishments of hell and purgatory, and the bliss of
the righteous who were awaiting their consummation in paradise. The vision of Drithelm was versified by Alcuin; other narratives of the
same kind appeared; the idea of such visions became familiar to men's minds;
and, six centuries later, the dreams of the obscure Irish or Northumbrian monks
issued in the great poem of the middle ages.
With the belief in purgatory, that in the utility of
the masses for the departed advanced. Fraternities were formed, especially
among monks, with the obligation to say a certain number of masses for the soul
of every brother at his death, and on the anniversary of it, or to provide for
the purchase of them by a payment which in England was called soulscot. The
performance of these masses became an important source of income to the clergy.
It is recognized as such by Chrodegang’s rule; and
for this purpose additional altars were erected in churches which before had
only one. Masses were also used in order to obtain temporal benefits, such as
fair weather or seasonable rain.
A greater strictness in the observance of the
Lord’s-day had gradually been introduced into the church, and occupations which
councils of the sixth century had vindicated against a judaizing tendency. were now forbidden as contrary to the sanctity of the day, which it
became usual to ground on the fourth commandment. Many canons throughout this
period, and shortly after, enact that it should be kept by a cessation from all
trade, husbandry, or other manual labour. No law-courts or markets may be held,
men are to refrain from hunting, women must not sew, embroider, weave, card
wool, beat flax, shear sheep, or publicly wash clothes. No journeys were to be
taken except such as were unavoidable; and these were to be so managed as not
to interfere with the duty of attending the church-service. The Penitential
ascribed to Theodore of Canterbury states that the Greeks and the Latins agree
in doing no work on Sunday; that they do not sail, ride, drive except to
church, hawk, or bathe; that the Greeks do not write in public, although at
home they write according to their convenience. Penalties were enacted against
such as should violate the sanctity of the day. Thus the council of Narbonne,
in 589, condemns a freeman to pay six solidi, and a serf to receive a hundred
lashes. Ina, king of Wessex (A.D. 688-725), directs that, if a serf work on the
Lord’s-day by his master's order, he shall be free ; if at his own will, he
shall pay a fine or shall “suffer in his hide”. The council of Berghamstead
(A.D. 696), enacts that a freeman breaking the rest of the day shall undergo
the healsfang and imposes a
heavy fine on any master who shall make his servant work between the sunset of
Saturday and that of Sunday. The authority of pretended revelations was called
in to enforce the observance of the Lord’s-day. It appears that this was the
object of a letter which was said to have fallen from heaven in 788, and of
which Charlemagne, in his capitulary of the following year, orders the
suppression; and the same pious fraud, or something of the same kind, was
employed in England. Under Lewis the Pious, councils are found speaking of
judgments by which persons had been punished for working on the Lord’s-day—some
had been struck by lightning, some lamed in their members, some reduced to
ashes by visible fire. The clergy, the nobles, and the emperor himself, are
desired to show a good example by a right observance of the day.
But notwithstanding the increased severity as to the
Lord’s-day, the idea of identifying it with the Jewish Sabbath was condemned.
Gregory the Great speaks of this as a doctrine of Antichrist, who, he says,
will require the observance of both days—of the Sabbath for the sake of
Judaism; of the Lord’s-day, because he will pretend to rival the Saviour’s
resurrection. Gregory goes on to notice the scruples of some who held that it
was wrong to wash the body on the Lord’s-day. It is allowed, he says, for necessity,
although not for luxury, alike on this and on other days, and he adds a curious
attempt at scriptural proof. The councils of Lestines and Verne censure an extreme rigour in the observance of the day, as “belonging
rather to Jewish superstition than to Christian duty”.
The Lord’s-day was commonly considered to begin on
Saturday evening, and to reach to the corresponding hour on Sunday. Such, as we
have seen, was the length of the labourer’s rest in England at the time of the
council of Berghamstead (A.D. 696); but by the middle of the tenth century it
was extended, and reached from nones (3 p.m.) on Saturday to the dawn of Monday
The festival of All Saints (which was intended to make
up for the defects in the celebration of saints individually) has been
generally connected with the beginning of this period, when Boniface IV
obtained a grant of the Pantheon at Rome from Phocas, and consecrated it as the
church of St. Mary ad Martyres in 609. It would,
however, appear that a festival of martyrs, on May 13, which arose out of the
consecration of the Pantheon, has been confounded with All Saints’ day (Nov.
1), and that the latter was not observed at Rome until the eighth century. It
was raised to the first class of festivals, and was recommended for general
celebration, by Gregory IV in 835. In the east, the Sunday after Whitsunday had
been connected with the memory of all saints as early as the time of St.
Chrysostom.
The growing reverence for the blessed Virgin led to an
increase of festivals dedicated to her. The“Presentation in the Temple” became the “Purification of St. Mary”. Her Nativity (Sept. 8)
was already celebrated both in the east and in the west, and her own
“Presentation” (i.e. her supposed dedication to the service of the
temple) was established as a festival in the Greek church (Nov. 21), although
it was not adopted in the west until the fourteenth century. In Spain, the
appearance vouchsafed to Ildefonso of Toledo led to the institution of the
“Expectation of St. Mary” (Dec. 18). The Assumption (Aug. 15) was also now
introduced. In the silence of Scripture as to the blessed Virgin’s death,
legends on the subject had arisen. At the time of the council of Ephesus (A.D. 431),
she was supposed to have spent her last years with St. John in that city, and
to have been interred in the church where the council met. But afterwards it
came to be believed that she had been buried in the valley of Jehoshaphat, and
thence had been caught up to heaven. From this tale, which originated in a
conjecture of Epiphanius that she never died, and was afterwards supported by
sermons falsely ascribed to Jerome and Augustine, the festival of the
Assumption took its rise. In one of the capitularies it is mentioned as a
subject for inquiry; but the observance of it is sanctioned by the council of Mayence (Mainz), in 813. The other festivals named in the
same canon are—Easter with the week following, Ascension-day, Whitsunday and
the week after it, the Nativity of St. John Baptist, St. Peter and St. Paul,
St. Michael, St. Remigius, St. Martin, St. Andrew, four days at Christmas, the
Circumcision, the Epiphany, and the Purification with the dedication of each
church, and the feasts of the martyrs and confessors whose relics are preserved
in the diocese or parish. This last provision contained the germ of a great multiplication
of festivals, which naturally ensued as saints of local fame became more
generally celebrated, and as their relics became more widely dispersed.
The council of Mayence also
sanctions the celebration of the Ember-weeks, which was now generally
established
The superstitions connected with an excess of
reverence for saints were continually on the increase. Stories of visions in
which saints appeared, and of miracles performed by them, are found in immense
profusion—so great, indeed, that even some contemporaries began to murmur. Thus
we are told by the biographer of St. Hildulf, abbot of Moyen-Moutier, in the
Vosges, who died in 707, that the death of one of his monks named Spinulus was followed by a number of miracles. Three
mineral springs burst forth in the abbey garden, and crowds of people were
attracted to the place. Hildulf understood the advantages which his house was
likely to derive from the offerings of pilgrims; but he feared that the monks
might be drawn away from their proper work to attend to earthly business. He
therefore knelt down at the tomb of Spinulus, and,
after having thanked God for the assurance of his brother's beatification,
charged the deceased monk, by the obedience which he had owed him while alive,
to save the society from the threatened danger. Spinulus complied; the springs dried up, and the miracles ceased. Other stories might be
produced, which show that some persons felt the general craving after miracles
to be unwholesome in its effects, even where they did not venture to question
the reality of the wonders which were reported.
The passion for relics was more and more developed.
The second council of Nicaea orders that no church should be consecrated
without some relies, and imputes a disregard of them to the opponents of
images; but these, as we have seen, were eager to relieve themselves of the
odium. Relics of our Lord and his virgin mother, the most precious class of
all, were multiplied. The seamless coat and the napkin which had bound the
Saviour’s head in the sepulchre were each supposed to be preserved in more than
one place. Among the treasures of the monastery of Centulles,
under abbot Angilbert, who died in 801, were fragments of the manger in which
our Lord was laid, of the candle lighted at his birth, of his vesture and
sandals, of the rock on which he sat when he fed the five thousand, of the wood
of the three tabernacles, of the bread which he gave to his disciples, of the
cross, and of the sponge; with portions of the blessed Virgin's milk, of her
hair, her dress, and her cloak. In honour of the cross were instituted
festivals of its Invention and Exaltation.
Other relics were also diligently sought for, and were
highly prized. Not only are saints said to have appeared, as in former ages,
for the purpose of pointing out the resting-places of their remains, but it was
believed that sometimes, in answer to earnest prayer, relics were sent down
from heaven. A great impulse was given to this kind of superstition when, on
the approach of the Lombards to Rome in 761, Pope Paul removed the bodies of
saints from their tombs outside the city to churches within the walls. The
Frankish records of the time abound in accounts of the translation of relics to
various places in France, and of the solemnities with which they were received.
The mere connexion with Rome was supposed to confer a sanctity and a miraculous
power. Thus it is related that Odo, duke of Aquitaine, a contemporary of
Charles Martel, having got possession of three sponges which had been used
in wiping the pope’s table, divided them into little morsels, which he
caused his soldiers to swallow before a battle; that no one of those who had
partaken was wounded, and that, while 375,000 Saracens were slain in one day,
the duke’s losses throughout the war amounted to only 1500 men
Charlemagne repeatedly condemns some ecclesiastical
superstitions, as well as those of the heathens whom he subdued. He forbids the
veneration of fictitious saints and doubtful martyrs the invocation or worship
of any saints except such as the church had approved, or the erection of
memorials to them by the wayside; the circulation of apocryphal or questionable
narratives; the introduction of new names of angels, in addition to those for
which there is scriptural authority—Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael. The council
of Mayence forbids the translation of the bodies of
saints, unless with permission from the sovereign and the bishops.
Legendary lives of saints were now produced in
wonderful abundance, and were the most popular literature of the times. In
addition to their falsehood (which, where consciously introduced, may have been
held excusable by the writers for the sake of the expected good effects) and to
their enforcement of all the errors which had grown upon the church, they were
blameable as teaching men to look for visible prosperity and chastisement
according to individual desert in the ordinary government of the world. Yet the
evil of such legends was not with-put a large compensation of good. They set
forth the power of religion, not only in miracles but in self-denial and
renunciation of earthly things. In contrast with the rudeness and selfishness
which generally prevailed, they presented examples which taught a spirit of
.gentleness and self-sacrifice, of purity, of patience, of love to God and man,
of disinterested toil, of forgiveness of enemies, of kindness to the poor and
the oppressed. The concluding part of the legend exhibited the saint triumphant
after his earthly troubles, yet still interested in his brethren who were
engaged in the struggle of life, and manifesting his interest by interpositions
in their behalf. And above all there was the continual inculcation of a
Providence watching over all the affairs of men, and ready to protect the
innocent, or to recompense and avenge their sufferings.
Even as early as the fourth century, some of the evils
attendant on the general practice of pilgrimage had been noticed by Gregory of
Nyssa and others; and strong complaints of a like kind continue to be found
from time to time. Gregory the Great tells Rusticiana,
a lady of the imperial court, that, while she had been on a pilgrimage to
Sinai, her affections had been at Constantinople, and expresses a suspicion
that the holy objects which she had seen with her bodily eyes had made no
impression on her heart. But the idle spirit in which pilgrimages were often
undertaken was not the worst mischief connected with them. Boniface writes to
archbishop Cuthbert that of the multitude of English women who flocked to Rome,
only a few escaped the ruin of their virtue; that it was rare to find a town of
Lombardy or France in which some dishonoured English nun or other female
pilgrim had not taken up her abode, and by her misconduct brought disgrace on
the church of her native land. Another unhappy effect of pilgrimages was, that
for the sake of it bishops and abbots absented themselves for years from their
proper spheres of labour, to the great injury of religion and discipline among
those committed to their care.
From Britain pilgrimages were most commonly made to
Rome, where the English had, in the neighbourhood of the Vatican basilica, a
quarter of their own, which was known by the Saxon name of Burg,—the
Borgo of later times. Some pilgrims from our island even found their way to the
Holy Land. In France the chief place of pilgrimage was the shrine of St.
Martin, at Tours; but the resort from that country to Rome became greater after
the accession of the Carolingian dynasty. The lives of pilgrims were regarded
as sacred, and many hospitals were built for their reception; among these was
one founded at Jerusalem by Charlemagne for the benefit of Latin pilgrims. The
emperor in 802 orders that no one, whether rich or poor, shall refuse to
pilgrims a roof, fire, and water, and encourages those who can afford more to
greater hospitality by a consideration of the recompense which Scripture
promises. There are, however, canons against some of the abuses connected with
pilgrimage. The council of Verne, in 755, orders that monks shall not be
allowed to wander to Rome without their abbot's consents The council of Châlons,
in 813, forbids the clergy to go either to Rome or to Tours without leave from
their bishop; and, while it acknowledges that pilgrimage is profitable for
those who have confessed their sins and have obtained directions for penance,
who amend their lives, give alms, and practise devotion, it denounces the error
of such as consider pilgrimage a licence to sin, and begs the emperor to take
measures against a common practice of nobles, who extorted from their
dependents the means of paying the expense of their own pilgrimages.
In some cases, persons who had been guilty of grievous
sin were condemned by way of penance to leave their country, and either to
wander for a certain time, or to undertake a pilgrimage to some particular
place. These penitents were furnished with letters from their bishops, which at
once made known their guilt and bespoke the charity of Christians for them.
Many of them were loaded with chains, or with rings which ate into the flesh
and inflicted excessive torture. Ethelwulf, the father of Alfred the Great, at
his visit to Rome in 855, obtained from Benedict III the privilege that no
Englishman should ever be obliged to leave his own country for this sort of
penance; but long before his time impostors had found their account in going
about naked and in irons under the pretence of having been sentenced to
pilgrimage for some fearful crime. The capitulary of 789 forbids such vagabonds
to roam about the country, and suggests that those who have really been guilty
of some great and unusual offence may perform their penance better by remaining
in one place
The discipline of the church in dealing with sin was
now regulated by penitential books. These books were of eastern origin; the
earliest of them was drawn up by John, patriarch of Constantinople, the
antagonist of Gregory the Great; the first Penitential in the western church
was that which is commonly ascribed to Theodore, the Greek archbishop of
Canterbury. As the impossibility of fulfilling the requirements of the ancient
canons had led to a general evasion or disregard of them, a scheme of commutation
was introduced; for example, a certain amount of fasting might be redeemed by
the recitation of a prescribed number of psalms. From this the transition was
easy to a system of pecuniary commutations—a system recommended by the analogy
of the wehr. That institution
had been extended from its original character of a composition for life to the
case of lesser bodily injuries, so that the loss of a limb, an eye, a finger,
or a tooth was to be atoned for by a fixed pecuniary fine; and the principle
was now introduced into the penitentials, where
offences were rated in a scale both of exercises and of money nearly resembling
that of the civil damages. As yet, however, these payments were not regarded as
a source of profit to the church, but were to be given to the poor, according
to the penitent’s discretion. In England, the rich were able to relieve
themselves in their penance by associating with themselves a number of poor
persons for the performance of it. By such means it was possible to clear off
seven years of penitence within a week; and, although the practice was
condemned by the council of Cloveshoo, it was
afterwards formally sanctioned.
The necessary effect of the new penitential system was
not only to encourage the fatal error of regarding money as an equivalent for
sin—an error against which some councils protested in vain, while the language
of others seems to countenance it—but to introduce a spirit of petty traffic
into the relations of sinners with their God. In opposition to this spirit
Gregory III said that canons ought not to lay down exactly the length of time
which should be assigned to penance for each offence, forasmuch as that which
avails with God is not the measure of time but of sorrow. The council of Châlons
denounces the penitential books, of which it says that “the errors are
certain and the authors uncertain”; it charges them with “sewing pillows to all
arm-holes”, and requires that penance should be restored to the footing of the
ancient canons; and there are similar passages in other French councils of the
ninth and tenth centuries.
Confession of secret sins was much insisted on; but
the priest was regarded rather as an adviser than as a judge, and the form of
his absolution was not judicial but precatory. Absolution was usually given
immediately after confession, and the prescribed penance was left to be
performed afterwards, so that, whereas in earlier ages the penitents had been
excluded for a time from the full communion of the church, they now remained in
it throughout.
The penalty of excommunication became in the Frankish
church much more severe than it had formerly been. The council of Verne lays
down that an excommunicate person “must not enter the church, nor partake of
food or drink with any Christian; neither may any one receive his gifts, or
kiss him, or join with him in prayer, or salute him”. It has been supposed that
the new terrors of this sentence were borrowed from the practice of the druids,
with a view to controlling the rude converts who would have disregarded a
purely spiritual penalty. The power of wielding it must doubtless have added
greatly to the influence of the clergy, although this effect did not yet appear
so fully as at a later period.
The trial of guilt or innocence by means of a solemn
appeal to heaven had been practised among many heathen nations, including those
of the north. The Mosaic law had sanctioned it in certain cases; it fell in
with the popular appetite for miracles, and the church now for a time took the
management of such trials into her own hands. The ordeal, or judgment of God,
was not to be resorted to where the guilt of an accused person was clear, but
in cases of suspicion, where evidence was wanting or insufficient. The appeal
was conducted with great solemnity. The accuser swore to the truth of his
charge; the accused (who for three days had been preparing himself by fasting
and prayer) asserted his innocence in the same manner; and he was adjured in
the most awful terms not to approach the Lord's table if he were conscious of
any guilt in the matter which was to be submitted to the Divine judgment. Both
parties then communicated; and after this, the clergy anointed the instruments
with which the trial was to be made.
The ordeal was of various kinds. That by judicial
combat or wager of battle was employed, not only for
the discovery of crime but in civil matters, such as disputes relating to the
boundaries of property. Otho the Great even resorted to it as a means of
determining a legal principle—whether at a man's death the children of a deceased
son should share in the inheritance with their surviving uncles. This manner of
appeal to the Divine judgment was introduced into the Burgundian law by the
Arian king Gundobald, the contemporary of Clovis,
against the remonstrances of Avitus, bishop of Vienne. It was not uncommon
among the Franks, but appears to have been unknown in England until after the
Norman conquest. Persons who were disqualified for undergoing this ordeal by
age, sex, bodily weakness, or by the monastic or clerical profession, were
allowed to fight by champions, who were usually hired, and were regarded as a
disreputable class. In like manner corporations or societies committed their
interests to champions. In the trial by hot iron, the accused walked barefoot
over heated ploughshares, or (which was the more usual form), he carried a
piece of glowing iron in his hand nine times the length of his foot. The foot
or the hand (as the case might be) was then bound up and sealed until the third
day, when it was examined, and according to its appearance the guilt or
innocence of the party was decided. The trial of hot water consisted in
plunging the arm into a boiling caldron, and taking out a stone, a ring, or a
piece of iron, which was hung at a greater or less depth in proportion to the
gravity of the offence in question. That of cold water was performed by
throwing the accused into a pond, with a cord attached to him, by which he
might be drawn out. If he were laden with weights, sinking was a proof of
guilt; if not, it was held to prove his innocence. In the ordeal of the “cross”
(which, notwithstanding the name which it acquired, was probably of heathen
origin), the accused or his proxy held up the right arm, or both arms y psalms
were sung during the trial, and the sinking or trembling of the arms was
evidence of guilt. Among other kinds of ordeal were—holding the hand in fire;
walking in a thin garment between two burning piles; eating a1 cake, which in
England was called the corsned; and
receiving the holy Eucharist.
Some of these practices were condemned after a time.
Lewis the Pious, after having in 816 prescribed the trial of the cross as a
means of deciding between contradictory witnesses, abolished it in the
following year, “lest that which hath been glorified by the passion of
Christ should through any man's rashness be brought to contempt”. Under the
same emperor, the ordeal of cold water was forbidden in 829, although in 824 it
had been sanctioned by Eugenius II—the only pope who ever countenanced the system
of ordeals. Agobard, archbishop of Lyons, a strenuous
opponent of popular superstitions, addressed to Lewis two tracts against the
judicial combat. He reflects on the heresy of the Burgundian king who had
sanctioned it. He denounces such duels as unchristian, and as involving a
breach of charity more important than any good which could be expected from
them. He argues that, if truth might be thus ascertained, all judges are
superfluous; that the system holds out a premium to brute strength and to
perjury; that the idea of its efficacy is contrary to Scripture, since we are
there taught to despise the success of this world—since God suffers his saints
to be slain, and has allowed believing nations to be overcome by unbelievers
and heretics; and he appeals to instances in which the vanity of such trials
had been manifested. The ordeal, however, continued to be supported by the
popular feeling, and the cause which Agobard had
opposed soon after found a powerful champion in Hincmar.
The privilege of asylum in the Germanic kingdoms
differed considerably from that which had existed under the Roman empire. It
arose out of the ancient national usages; the object of it was not to bestow
impunity on the criminal, but to protect him against hasty and irregular
vengeance, to secure for him a legal trial, to afford the clergy an opportunity
of interceding for him, and, if possible, of mitigating his punishment. The
operation of this institution was aided by the system of pecuniary composition
for wrongs. The clergy were usually able to stipulate for the safety of the
offender’s life and limbs on condition that he should pay a suitable fine, or
perhaps that he should submit to a course of penance. Charlemagne in 779
limited the right of sanctuary by enacting that murderers or other capital
offenders should not be allowed to take refuge in churches, and that, if they
gained admittance, no food should be given to them. According to the ancient
Roman idea of asylum, the denial of food would have been an impiety sufficient
to draw down some judgment from the patron saint of a church; but it was not
inconsistent with the German view. The clergy, however, soon discovered a way
of evading this law, by construing it as applicable to impenitent criminals only—i.e. to
such as should refuse to confess to the priest and to undergo ecclesiastical
penance—a refusal which was not likely to be frequent, where it involved the
choice between death by hunger and the forfeiture of sanctuary. The prohibition
of food does not appear in later enactments of the reign.
The church could not fail to derive popularity from
the power of offering shelter within its precincts against the lawlessness of
which the world was then so full. With a view of investing it with such
popularity among his new subjects, Charlemagne ordered, in his capitulary for
Saxony (A.D. 785), that any person who should take sanctuary should, for the
honour of God and His church, be safe in life and limb, and should be
unmolested until the next court-day, when he was to be sentenced to make
suitable amends for his offence. In legislating for the country after it had
been reduced to a more settled state, this privilege was withdrawn, and the
church was required to surrender up persons convicted of capital crimes
Among the Anglo-Saxons, the earliest law on the
subject of asylum was that of Ina, in 696, which ordered that fugitives guilty
of capital crimes should have their life protected by the church, but should be
bound to make legal satisfaction; and that delinquents who had "put their
hide in peril"—i.e. who had incurred the penalty of whipping—should be
forgiven. But the shelter of the church was only to be granted for a certain
time. The laws of Alfred (A.D. 877) limit it in some monasteries to three days;
but it was afterwards extended, and even in the same laws a longer term is
allowed to other places. Persons guilty of murder, treason, or crimes against
religion, might ordinarily be dragged even from the altar; but some churches of
especial sanctity, among which that of Croyland enjoyed the most extensive immunities, had the right of protecting all
fugitives whatever. The effect of such a privilege was probably felt as a
serious hindrance to the execution of justice; for when Croyland,
after having been laid waste by the Danes, was restored in the reign of Edred
by his chancellor Turketul, the aged statesman
declined to accept a renewal of its ancient rights of sanctuary.
Slavery.
Instead of absolutely condemning slavery as an
unlawful institution—a course which would probably have introduced anarchy into
society, and would have raised a serious hindrance to the progress of the
Gospel—the New Testament had been content to prepare the way for its gradual
abolition by exhorting both master and slave to the performance of their mutual
duties on the ground of their common brotherhood in Christ. And as yet the
church aimed only at a mitigation, not at an extinction, of slavery.
Servitude was of two kinds—that of slaves properly so
called, and that of the coloni. The
slaves were individually liable to removal and sale; they were incapable, under
the Roman empire, of contracting a legitimate marriage, and their property
belonged to their master. The coloni were
regarded as freeborn, so that, unlike slaves, they might become soldiers; they
were attached to the land, so that they could not be separated from it, nor
could it be sold without them. They were capable of marriage and of possessing
property; for the land which they cultivated they paid a fixed rent, generally
in kind, and they were subject to the land-tax and to a poll-tax. It would,
however, seem difficult to distinguish thoroughly between these classes in the
canons which relate to the subject.
The Penitential ascribed to Theodore of Canterbury
notes it as a point of difference between the eastern and the western monks,
that, while the Latins have slaves, the Greeks have none. The oriental monks
themselves performed the labour which was elsewhere devolved on slaves; it was
usual for persons entering on the monastic life to emancipate their slaves; and
some teachers, as Isidore of Pelusium in the fifth
century, and Theodore the Studite in the ninth, altogether questioned, or even
denied, the lawfulness of having such property. In the west there are
occasional appearances of a like kind. Thus Wilfrid, on getting possession of
the isle of Selsey, emancipated all the serfs who
were attached to the soil, and Benedict of Aniane,
whose ideas were chiefly drawn from the eastern monastic rules, on receiving
gifts of land for his monasteries, refused to accept the serfs with it.
Somewhat in the same spirit was the enactment of the council of Chalchythe, in
816, that a bishop at his death should liberate such of his English slaves as
had been reduced to bondage in his own time. But the usual practice of the west
was different. In donations of land to the church, the serfs passed with the
soil, as in other transfers. Bishops were restrained by a regard, for the
property of their churches from emancipating the serfs who belonged to these;
the fourth council of Toledo (A.D. 633) declared such emancipation to be a
robbery of the church; it enacted that the next bishop should assert his right
over any persons whom his predecessor had thus wrongfully liberated, and that
any bishop wishing to emancipate a slave should indemnify the church by
providing another in his stead. An earlier council— that of Agde,
in 506—had restrained the power of bishops to alienate slaves; and, in a spirit
curiously opposed to the oriental principles, it forbade monks to manumit their
slaves, “lest they should keep holiday while the monks work”. It was even found
that some persons—whether from a reckless spirit of mistaken devotion, or from
a calculation of the advantages and disadvantages of the two
conditions—voluntarily made over themselves and their descendants in servitude
to some church; and for such an act special forms were provided.
Yet with all this the church did very much to abate
the evils of slavery. It insisted on the natural equality of men and on the
brotherhood of Christians, as motives to kindness towards slaves; and in the
treatment of its own dependants it held out an example to lay masters. It threw
open its sanctuaries to those who fled from cruelty; it secured their pardon
before surrendering them to their owners; it denounced excommunication against
any master who should break a promise made to a fugitive slave.
It placed the killing of a slave without judicial
authority on the same footing of guilt as the killing of a freeman. It
endeavoured to restrain the sale of slaves, by limiting the power which parents
among the heathen nations exercised over their own offspring, and by
prohibiting that any should be sold to Jews or heathens. It encouraged the
redemption of captives, and declared the enfranchisement of slaves to be a work
conducive to salvation; and it was through the influence of the church that
innumerable masters directed by their wills that their slaves should be set
free “for the deliverance of their own souls”. The liberation was often, as
under the Roman law, visibly associated with religion by being performed at the
altar, where the master resigned his slave to the church, with which the
freedman was thenceforth connected by a peculiar tie—he and his descendants
paying some slight acknowledgment to it, while, in the failure of posterity,
the church was heir to his property.
There was also another way by which the church
signally contributed to raise the estimation of the servile classes. As the
freemen of the conquering nations were prevented from becoming clergy or
monks without the sovereign’s leave, in order that he might not lose their
military service, the bishops were obliged to recruit the ranks of their clergy
chiefly from the classes which were below the obligation to such serviced The
fourth council of Toledo requires that serfs ordained to be clergymen should be
emancipated; but it was not until the year 817, in the reign of Lewis the
Pious, that a similar law was established in France, although before that time
the clergy of servile race had been exempted from servile duties. The serf,
when ordained, became capable of rising to honour and power; when promoted
beyond the minor orders, he was assessed at a wehr corresponding
to that of high secular rank; and this rose with each step to which he was
advanced in the hierarchy. The clergy who had thus been raised from a servile
condition to dignity and influence felt themselves bound (apart from all
religious motives) to labour for the benefit of the class to which they had
originally belonged, and a general elevation of that class was the result.
The advancement of persons servilely born to high
ecclesiastical station was not, however, unattended by a mixture of bad
effects. Thegan, the biographer of Lewis the Pious,
gives a very unfavourable representation of such clergy. He tells us that, when
they have attained to offices of dignity, the gentleness of their former
manners is exchanged for insolence, quarrelsomeness, domineering, and
assumption; that they emancipate their relations, and either provide for them
by church-preferment or marry them into noble families; and that these upstarts
are insufferably insolent to the old nobility. The picture is no doubt coloured
both by Thegan’s prejudices as a man of high birth,
and by his indignation at the behaviour of some ecclesiastics towards his
unfortunate sovereign; but the parallels both of history and of our own
experience may assure us of its substantial truth.