Book 2 — CHAPTER VIII. THE BISHOP.

Whatever variety of form the heathendom of the Anglosaxons may have assumed in different districts, we are justified in asserting that a sacerdotal class existed, and that there were different grades of rank within it. We hear of priests, and of chief priests; and it is not unnatural to conclude that to the latter some pre-eminence in dignity, if not in power, was conceded over their less-distinguished colleagues. Similarly, the necessities of internal government and regulation, and the analogy of secular administration, had gradually supplied the Christian communities with a well-organized system of hierarchy, which commencing with the lower ministerial functions, passed upward through the presbyterate, the episcopal and metropolitan ordinations, and found its culminating point and completion in the patriarchates of the eastern and western churches. The paganism of the Old World, which admitted the participation of different classes in the public rites of religion, if it did not cause, could at least easily reconcile itself to, this systematic division. Our own heathen state is not well known enough to enable us to affirm as much of our forefathers; but the immediate foundation of 343an episcopal church in all the newly-converted Teutonic countries, seems to show that no difficulty existed or was apprehended as to its ready reception. In England, as elsewhere, the introduction of Christianity was immediately followed by the establishment of bishops. But it is necessary to draw a distinction between the effects of this establishment in England and in various parts of the continent. As we pursue the inquiries which necessarily meet us in investigating the history of conversion in the West, we are led to a remarkable fact, viz. that the power of the Roman see was, generally speaking, most substantially founded by the efforts and energy of Teutonic prelates; while a much more steady opposition to its triumph was offered by the provincials who usually filled the episcopal office in the cities of Gaul.

The apparent strangeness of this however soon vanishes, when we consider the many grounds upon which the Gallic churches contested the immediate supremacy of Rome. The archbishop of Vienne long claimed the patriarchal authority in Gaul, upon the same grounds as the bishops of Rome and Constantinople claimed it in those cities^[833]. Many of the provincial churches boasted an antiquity hardly inferior to the Roman, and a foundation not less illustrious; many had shown in persecution and suffering a spirit of Christian perseverance and a steadfastness of faith, which the City itself had not exceeded in her own hour of trial. Above all, there continued to exist a vigorous nationality in 344Gaul, however oppressed and bridled by the energy of the Frankish conquerors, especially in Neustria or the northern portion of modern France. To this spirit of nationality, based upon ancient descent and long familiarity with the civilization of the Roman empire, and fed in turn by a great amount of material prosperity, we must refer the complete dissolution of the Carolingian empire itself, and the establishment of the counts of Paris as kings in the western districts of that unwieldy body.

It is true that the Western Church did not lay definite claim to any such total independence as Cyprian vindicated for his African communities: the good offices and arbitration of St. Peter’s successor were sought in disputed and doubtful cases, even if we cannot admit of positive appeals to the Roman curia: the bishops of Burgundy, Provence and Spain, early found that union with the oldest and most respected church of the West offered an important defence of orthodoxy threatened by the Arian and semi-Arian dogma of the barbarians who had wrested those fine provinces from the empire: and the popes were not unwilling to encourage a tendency which helped to realize the idea of a pre-eminence in their church over all the Christian communities.^[834] The institution of Missi, or special commissioners, was familiar: they adopted it, and 345at a very early period we find papal vicars exercising some sort of authority in Gaul, and perhaps even in Britain.

The conversion of Clovis to the orthodox faith, instead of that which he might have learned from his Arian neighbours, was not only a source of power and importance to the Catholic bishops of Gaul, but ultimately of the greatest moment to the bishop of Rome. We must admit that under the Merwingian kings, the popes enjoyed some authority and great consideration in Gaul, though not enough to endanger the independence and freedom of the Gallican church: but under the family of Pipin they necessarily occupied a very different position. For during the earlier years of the imperial constitution, Rome was a city, and its bishop to a certain extent an officer, of the empire, and the power and influence of the popes was advanced by the Frankish emperor as best might suit his own purposes. It is assuredly not true that under Charlemagne those bishops ventured upon any of the usurpations which they succeeded in substantiating under later emperors.

During the reign of Hluduuig indeed, a pious but weak prince, they obtained various concessions which in process of time bore fruit of power^[835]. It 346was reserved for later days to witness the triumph of Roman independence through the combination of communal with priestly tendencies. This combination first darkly arose when the nationality of Rome itself burst forth, encouraged by the vigour with which the bishop made head against the invading Saracens in Italy, supported the orthodox prelates of the southern kingdoms, Arles, Burgundy and Spain against Arian dukes and governors, and regulated the internal affairs of the city, neglected by its Frankish patricians and missi. At this time too Rome had no competitor: Africa had fallen, Constantinople had abdicated her imperial position, the cities and the sees of the East had vanished together; Rome—at least one of the oldest—was now unquestionably the most powerful of the Christian churches. She had all the prestige of the old empire, and all the support of the new one which she had helped to found upon the ruins of the old.

But this gradual advance and this commanding power could not at first have been contemplated. It is a common error to suppose that great results, which seem necessarily produced by a long series of combined causes, have from the first been prepared and foreseen. The spectator in his own struggle after a logical unity rejects the accidental and accessory facts, to fix his eyes upon the apparently essential development; and supposes everything to have been grasped together, because his intellect cannot conceive the whole variety of occurrences without so grasping them. The relations of Rome with the Franks were hardly the consequence 347of any deliberate or well-considered plan. The Frankish kings had been selected as patrons merely because they could afford the protection which was looked for in vain from Constantinople, or indeed any other quarter; and had Italy not been overrun by Germanic invaders of various race, from whose power there seemed no refuge, save in other and still more barbarous Germanic defenders, the Western empire might never have been restored: but when once it was so restored,—from the moment when Pope Leo and the Roman municipality agreed to place the command of the city, and the rights of the ancient Caesars, in the hands of a barbarian king,—but one capable of appreciating and securing all the advantages of his great position,—Rome itself became not only identified with the new views, but necessary to their fulfilment^[836]. Had the new emperor been a Roman, or 348had he selected Rome as his residence, and thus made it the local as well as real and political centre of his power, the Papacy would probably never have attained its territorial authority. But the Frankish king remained true to the habits of his people and of his predecessors, resided in peaceful times at Ingleheim or Aix la Chapelle, and spent years in wandering from one royal vill to another, or in the duties of active warfare upon the several confines of his empire; and thus the government of the eternal city practically fell into the hands of Frankish officers, dukes, missi, counts palatine, and 349ministerials, who gradually proved no match for the enlightened skill, unwearied diplomacy and increasing power of the pontiffs, the Roman aristocratic families, and the resuscitated municipality: yet the popes had hardly succeeded in attaining to a complete independence of the German Caesars, when the son of Hugues, called Capet, expelled the last Caroling from the soil of France; though in the course of a policy long inexorably pursued, they had gone far to prepare for a dismemberment of the empire which was to be of more important consequence to the world than even that separation^[837]. In 956—the year in which Eádwig, the mark of monkish calumny, came to the throne of England, the Patrician Octavian, son of Alberic of Spoleto, and through him grandson of the scandalous Marozia, caused himself to be elected Pope; and thus united the highest worldly and spiritual authorities in the city, concentrating in his own person all the rights both of the empire and the papacy^[838].

Three hundred and sixty years earlier, Gregory, then bishop of Rome, had despatched a missionary adventure to this country.

350The zeal of modern polemics has dealt more hardly with Gregory than justice demands^[839]. Who shall dare to attribute to him, or to any other man, entire freedom from human error, or total absence of those faults which, for the very happiness of man, are found to chequer the most perfect of human characters? But even if we admit that he shared, to not less than the usual degree, in the weakness and selfishness of our nature, it is impossible to withhold the meed of our admiration from the man whose intellect could combine, whose prudence could direct, and whose courage could cope with, all the details of a conversion such as that of Saxon England. Let us only consider the circumstances under which he found himself placed at home, and we shall the better comprehend the power of mind which could devise and execute the vast design of a spiritual colonization, a transplantation of religion as it were from Rome the centre, to Britain the extreme, the least known, and most barbarous point of the ancient empire^[840]. Temporal as well as spiritual ruler of the city, abandoned by those miserable intriguers who inherited from the emperors nothing but their title and their vices, and pressed on every side by the vigorous advance of the Langobardic arms, it was 351Gregory’s fate or fortune to pass in the midst of political excitement a life which he had hoped to devote to pious meditation. But he possessed a character capable of moulding itself to all the exigencies of his situation; whether reluctantly or not, he flung himself into the gap, and comprehended, with a perfect singleness of insight, that to whom belongs the post of greatest honour, on him lies also the burthen of the greatest toil and greatest danger. By turns soldier, captain, negotiator, and priest,—now wielding the pen to instruct, now the sword to protect or to chastise,—now pouring passionate exhortations from his pulpit, now providing for the resources of his commissariat, or superintending the builders engaged on the material defences of his walls,—we see in him one of those men whom troublous times have often educated to cope with themselves, and whose names have thus justly become the very landmarks and pivots of history.

A great writer, who sometimes suffers his hostility against Christianity and its professors to outweigh the calmer judgment of the historian, has left us this graphic account of the condition of Rome at the end of the sixth century^[841].

“Amidst the arms of the Lombards, and under the despotism of the Greeks, we again inquire into the fate of Rome^[842], which had reached, about the 352close of the sixth century, the lowest period of her depression. By the removal of the seat of empire, and the successive loss of the provinces, the sources of public and private opulence were exhausted; the lofty tree, under whose shade the nations of the earth had reposed, was deprived of its leaves and branches, and the sapless trunk was left to wither on the ground. The ministers of command and the messengers of victory no longer met on the Appian or Flaminian Way, and the hostile approach of the Lombards was often felt and continually feared. The inhabitants of a potent and peaceful capital, who visit without an anxious thought the garden of the adjoining country, will faintly picture in their fancy the distress of the Romans; they shut or opened their gates with a trembling hand, beheld from the walls the flames of their houses, and heard the lamentations of their brethren, who were coupled together like dogs, and dragged away into distant slavery beyond the sea and the mountains. Such incessant alarms must annihilate the pleasures and interrupt the labours of a rural life; and the Campagna of Rome was speedily reduced to the state of a dreary wilderness, in which the land is barren, the waters are impure, and the air is infectious. Curiosity and ambition no longer attracted the nations to the capital of the world: but if chance or necessity directed the steps of a wandering stranger, he contemplated with horror the vacancy and solitude of the city, and might be tempted to ask, Where is the senate, and where are the people? In a season of excessive rains, 353the Tiber swelled above its banks, and rushed with irresistible violence into the valleys of the seven hills. A pestilential disease arose from the stagnation of the deluge, and so rapid was the contagion, that fourscore persons expired in an hour in the midst of a solemn procession, which implored the mercy of heaven^[843]. A society in which marriage is encouraged and industry prevails, soon repairs the accidental losses of pestilence and war; but as the far greater part of the Romans was condemned to hopeless indigence and celibacy, the depopulation was constant and visible, and the gloomy enthusiasts might expect the approaching failure of the human race^[844].”

It was in the midst of scenes such as these that Gregory found time to organize the mission of Augustine to Britain. In the absence of definite information, derived from his own account, or the relations of his friends and contemporaries, it is impossible to penetrate the motives which led the pontiff to this step. They have been variously interpreted by the zeal of opposing historians, who have construed them by the light of their own prejudices, in favour of the conflicting interests of their respective churches. Nor, with such insufficient 354means, do we attempt to reconcile their differences: human motives are rarely unmixed, rarely all good or all evil: it is possible that there may be some truth in all the conflicting views which have been taken of this great act; that while an earnest missionary spirit, and deep feeling of responsibility, led the Pope to carry the blessings of an orthodox Christianity to the distant and benighted tribes of Britain, he may have contemplated—not without pardonable complacency—the growth of a church immediately dependent upon his see for guidance and instruction. It may be that some lingering whispers of vanity or ambition spoke of the increase of wealth or dignity or power which might thus accrue to the patriarchate of the West. Nay, who shall say that, looking round in his despair upon Rome itself and the disject members of its once mighty empire, he may not even have thought that England, inaccessible from its seas, and the valour of its denizens, might one day offer a secure refuge to the last remains of Roman faith and nationality, and their last, but not least noble, defender?

To the pontiff and the statesman it was not unknown that the Britannic islands were occupied by two populations different alike in their descent and in their fortunes; the elder and the weaker, of Keltic blood; the younger and the conquering race, an offshoot of that great Teutonic stock, whose branches had overspread all the fairest provinces of the empire, and had now for the most part adopted something of the civilization, together 355with the profession, of Christianity. He was aware that commercial intercourse, nay even family alliances, had already connected the Anglosaxons with those Franks, who, in opposition to the Arian Goths, Burgundians and Langobards, had accepted the form of faith considered orthodox by the Roman See^[845]. The British church, he no doubt knew, in common with others which claimed to have been founded by the Apostles^[846], still retained some rites and practices which had either never been sanctioned or were now abandoned at Rome: but still the communion of the churches had been maintained as well as could be expected between such distant establishments. British bishops had appeared in the Catholic synods^[847], and the church of the Keltic aborigines reverenced with affectionate zeal the memory of the missionaries whom it was the boast of Rome to have sent forth for her 356instruction or confirmation in the faith^[848]. On the other hand, it had reached the ears of the Pope, that the Germanic conquerors themselves yearned for the communication of the glad tidings of salvation; that tolerance was found in at least one court,—and that, one of preponderating influence; while an unhappy instinct of national hatred had induced the British Christians to withhold all attempts to spread the Gospel among their heathen neighbours^[849].

357Under these circumstances, in the year 596, at the very moment when the ancient metropolis of the world seemed on the point of falling under the yoke of the Langobards, Augustine and his forty companions set out to carry the faith to the extreme islands of the West,—a deed as heroic as when Scipio marched for Zama, and left the terrible Carthaginian thundering at the gates of the city. Furnished with letters of introduction to facilitate their passage through Gaul, where they were to provide themselves with interpreters, and where, in the event of success, Augustine was to receive episcopal consecration, the adventurers finally landed in Kent, experienced a gentle reception from Æðelberht, and obtained permission to preach the faith among his subjects. In an incredibly short space of time—if we may credit the earliest historian of the Anglosaxon church—their efforts were crowned with success in the more important districts of the island; Canterbury, Rochester and London received the distinction of episcopal sees; swarms of energetic missionaries from Rome, from Gaul, from Burgundy, followed on their track, eager to aid their labours, and share their triumph; and at length the Keltic Scots themselves, emulous of their successes, or awakened, though late, to a sense of their own culpable neglect, entered vigorously upon the vacant field, and preached the Gospel to the pagan tribes north of the Humber, and in the central provinces of England. The progress of the new creed was not, 358however, one unchequered triumph: in Wales and Scotland the embittered Kelts refused not only canonical submission to the missionary archbishop, but even Catholic communion with his neophytes^[850]. In Eastanglia, Essex, nay Kent itself, apostacy followed upon the death of the first converted kings; while Wessex remained true to its ancient paganism; and Penda of Mercia, tolerant of Christianity although himself no Christian, was dangerous through his very indifference, his ambition, and the triumphs of his arms over successive Northumbrian princes. Still the great aim of Gregory was not to be vain, and despite kings and peoples, nay even despite the faintheartedness and “little faith” of the missionaries, the work of conversion did go on and prosper, until it embraced every portion of the island, and every part of England made at least an outward profession of Christianity.

No sooner had the new creed found a reception 359among the Saxons than the establishment of bishoprics followed in every separate kingdom. The intention of Gregory had been to appoint two metropolitans, each with twelve suffragan bishops, one having his cathedral in London, the other in York. But political events prevented the execution of this plan: Canterbury retained the primacy of the greater part of England, and (except during a very few years) the rule over all the bishops on this side the Humber; while York, after receiving an archbishop in the person of Paulinus, remained for nearly a century after his death under a bishop only; and never succeeded in establishing more than four suffragan sees, which were finally reduced to two. This state of things naturally sprang from the circumstances under which the conversion took place. Had England been subject to one central power, or had the relinquishment of paganism taken place simultaneously in the several districts, a general system might have been introduced whose leading features might have been in accordance with Gregory’s desire; but this was not the case. The work of conversion was subject to many difficulties which could not have been appreciated at Rome. The pope had probably but sparing knowledge of the relations which existed between the Anglosaxon kingdoms, and how little concert could be expected from their scattered and hostile rulers. Nor could he have anticipated a jealous and sullen resistance on the part of the Keltic Christians, which was perhaps not altogether unprovoked by the indiscreet pretensions of Augustine^[851]. 360But the first bishops were in fact strictly missionaries,—as much so as the bishop of New Zealand among the Maori,—heads of various bodies of voluntary adventurers, who at their own great peril bore the tidings of salvation to the pagan inhabitants of distant and separate localities. Prudence indeed dictated the propriety of commencing with those whose authority might tend to secure their own safety, and whose example would be a useful confirmation of their arguments; whose own religious convictions also were less likely to be of a settled and bigotted character than those of the villagers in the Marks. Christianity, which in its outset commenced with the lowest and poorest classes of society, and slowly widened its circuit till it embraced the highest, thus reversed the process in England, and commenced with the courts and households of the kings.

Accordingly the conversion of a king was generally followed by the establishment of a see, the princes being apparently desirous of attaching a Christian prelate to their comitatus, in place of the Pagan high-priest who had probably occupied a similar position. Considerations of personal dignity, not less than policy, may have led to this result: the lurking remains of heathen superstition may 361not have been without their weight: whatever were the cause, we find at first a bishopric co-extensive with a kingdom^[852]. But this was obviously an insufficient provision in the larger districts, as Christianity continued its triumphant course, and towards the close of the seventh century, Theodore, the first archbishop who succeeded in uniting all the English church under his authority, finally accomplished the division of the larger sees. From this period till the ninth century, when the invasions of the Northmen threw all the established institutions into confusion, the English sees appear to have ranked in the following order^[853]:—

362Province of Canterbury.—1. Lichfield. 2. Leicester. 3. Lincoln. 4. Worcester. 5. Hereford. 6. Sherborne. 7. Winchester. 8. Elmham. 9. Dummoc. 10. London. 11. Rochester. 12. Selsey.

Province of York.—1. Hexham. 2. Lindisfarn. 3. Whiterne.

Thus, inclusive of Canterbury and York, there were seventeen sees. At a later period some of these perished altogether, as Lindisfarn, Hexham, Whiterne and Dummoc; while others were formed, as Durham for Northumberland, Dorchester for Lincoln; and in Wessex, Ramsbury (Hræfnesbyrig, Ecclesia Corvinensis) for Wilts, Wells for Somerset, Crediton for Devonshire, and during some time, St. Petroc’s or Padstow for Cornwall.

The earliest bishops among the Saxons were necessarily strangers. Romans occupied the cathedral thrones of Canterbury, Rochester and London, and for a while that of York also. Northumberland next passed for a short time under the direction of Keltic prelates,—Scots as they were then called,—who held no communion with the Romish missionaries. Felix, a Burgundian, but not an Arian, evangelized Eastanglia; Birinus, a Frank, carried the faith to Wessex. But as these men gradually left the scene of their labours, which must have been much increased by the difficulty of teaching populations who spoke a strange language, by means of interpreters, their Saxon pupils addressed themselves to the work with exemplary zeal and earnestness; it was very soon found that the island could supply itself with prelates fully equal to all 363the duties of their position; and to a mere accident was the English church indebted at the end of the seventh century for a foreign metropolitan, in the person of Theodore of Tarsus. Although we may reasonably suppose the traditions of the heathen priesthood not to have been without some weight, we must not conclude that these alone will account for the number of noble Anglosaxons whom, from the earliest period, we find devoting themselves to the service of the church, and clothed with its highest dignities. It must be admitted that nowhere else did Christianity make a deeper or more lasting impression than in England. Not only do we see the high nobles and the near relatives of kings among the bishops and archbishops, but kings themselves—warlike and fortunate kings—suddenly and voluntarily renouncing their temporal advantages, retiring into monasteries, and abdicating their crowns, that they may wander as pilgrims to the shrines of the Apostles in Rome. We find princesses and other high-born ladies devoting themselves to a life of celibacy, or separating from their husbands to preside over congregations of nuns: well descended men cannot rest till they have wandered forth to carry the tidings of redemption into distant and barbarous lands; a life of abstinence and hardship, to be crowned by a martyr’s death, seems to have been hungered and thirsted after by the wealthy and the noble,—assuredly an extraordinary and an edifying spectacle among a race not at all adverse to the pomps and pleasures of worldly life, a spectacle which compels us to believe in 364the deep, earnest, conscientious spirit of self-sacrifice and love of truth which characterized the nation.

The complete organization of the ecclesiastical power in England appears to have been effected by Theodore, who is distinctly affirmed to have been the first prelate whose authority the whole church of the Angles consented to admit^[854]. There is reason to suppose that this was not accomplished without some difficulty, for it involved the division of previously existing dioceses, and the consequent diminution of previously existing power and influence. Theodore, like Augustine, had been despatched from Rome to England, under very peculiar circumstances. After the death of Deusdedit, archbishop of Canterbury, a difficulty appears to have arisen about the election of a successor, in consequence of which the see remained for some time without an occupant^[855]. At length however Oswiú of Northumberland and Ecgberht of Kent undertook to put a period to a state of affairs which must have caused grave inconveniences^[856], and accordingly 365they took, with the election and consent of the church, a presbyter of the late archbishop, named Wigheard, and sent him to Rome for consecration. It is most remarkable that we hear nothing of any co-operation on the part of Wessex in this step, or of the powerful king of Mercia, Wulfhere, who had succeeded in establishing the independence of his country against all the efforts of Oswiú himself. Shortly after his arrival in Rome Wigheard died, and after some correspondence with the English kings, Vitalian undertook to provide a prelate for the vacant see^[857]. Various difficulties being finally overcome, his choice fell 366upon Theodore of Tarsus, who accordingly was despatched to England with the power of an archbishop, and solemnly enthroned at Canterbury in 668.

Hitherto there had been churches in England; henceforward there was a church,—and a body of clergy existing as a central institution, in spite of the separation and frequent hostility of the states to which the clergy themselves belonged. No doubt the common rank and interests of the bishops, as well as the necessity for canonical consecration had from the first produced some sort of union among them. But from the time of Theodore we find at 367least the southern prelates assembling in provincial synods, under the direction of the metropolitan, to declare the faith as it was found among them, establish canons of discipline and rules of ecclesiastical government, and generally to make such arrangements as appeared likely to conduce to the well-being of the church, without regard to the severance of the kingdoms. To these synods, which though not holden twice a year in accordance with Theodore’s plan, and indeed with the ancient canons of the church, were yet of frequent occurrence, the bishops repaired, accompanied by some of their co-presbyters and monks, and when the business before them was completed, returned to promulgate in their dioceses the regulations of the council, and spread among their clergy the news of what was doing in other lands for the furtherance of the Gospel.

The respectful deference paid to the Roman See was thus naturally converted into a much closer and more intimate relation. Saxon England was essentially the child of Rome; whatever obligations any of her kingdoms may have been under to the Keltic missionaries,—and I cannot persuade myself that these were at all considerable,—she certainly had entirely lost sight of them at the close of the seventh and the commencement of the eighth centuries. Her national bishops, as the Kelts and disciples of the Kelts have been unjustifiably called, had either retired in disgust, like Colman, or been deposed like Winfrið, or apostatized like Cedd. It was to Rome that her nobles and prelates wandered 368as pilgrims; it was the interests of Rome that her missionaries preached in Germany^[858] and Friesland; it was to her that the archbishops elect looked for their pall^[859]—the sign of their dignity: 369to the Pope her prelates appealed for redress, or for authority: in the eighth century we find one 370pope sanctioning the formation of a third archiepiscopal see, in defiance of the metropolitan of Canterbury; and in the first year of the ninth century we find this new arrangement abrogated by the same authority. Lastly it was England that gave to Rome Wilfrið and Willibrord and Adelberht, Boniface and Willibald, Anselm and Becket and Robert of Winchelsea.

Although these facts will not suffice to establish that sort of dependence de iure, which zealous Papal partizans have asserted as the normal condition 371of the English church, they do indisputably prove that the example, advice and authority of the See of Rome were very highly regarded among our forefathers. It was impossible that it should be otherwise; and there is not the slightest doubt that—despite the Keltic clergy—the Anglosaxon church looked with affection and respect to Rome as the source of its own being. Respect and high regard were paid to Rome in Gaul long before Theodore; but not such submission as our countrymen, less acquainted no doubt with their danger, were zealous to pay. Indeed, when we consider 372the position of the Roman See towards the North of Europe, during the interval from the commencement of the seventh till that of the ninth century, we can scarcely escape from the conclusion that England was the great basis of papal operations, and the ποῦ στῶ from which Rome moved her world. In the ninth century a continental author calls the English “maxime familiares apostolicae sedis^[860],” and in the tenth century it was unquestionably England that made the greatest progress, even if it did not take the initiative with regard to the revival of monachism and the great question of clerical celibacy. In short, throughout, the most energetic and successful missionaries of Rome were Englishmen.

But England nevertheless retained in some sense a national church. Many circumstances combined to ensure a very considerable amount of independence in this country. On the continent of Europe the prelates and clergy whom the invasions of the barbarians found established in the cities were, in fact, Roman provincials; and this character continued for a very long time to modify their relations toward the conquerors: in Britain, either Christianity was never widely and generally spread, or it retreated before the steady advance of the pagan Saxons. It is remarkable that we nowhere hear of the existence of Christian churches before Augustine, except in the territory exclusively British, 373and in the household of Æðelberht’s Frankish queen, the latter an exception of little moment.

But no sooner do the first missionary prelates vanish from the scene, than we find them replaced by Saxons belonging to the noblest and most powerful families, and thus connecting the clergy with the state by that most close and intimate tie which forms the strongest and least objectionable security for both. Berhtwald, the eighth archbishop of Canterbury, was a very near relative of the Mercian king Æðelred; Aldhelm was closely connected with the royal family of Wessex; and even down to the Conquest we find the scions of the royal and noble houses occupying distinguished stations in the ministry of the Church. It is obvious how much this near and intimate association with the national aristocracy must have tended to diminish the evils of a separate institution, having some kind of dependence upon a foreign centre; and when to this it is added that the principal clergy, as ministers of state and members of the Witena gemót, had a clear and distinct interest in the maintenance of good government, and a personal share in its administration, we can easily understand why the clergy were, generally speaking, kept better within bounds in England than in other contemporaneous states^[861]. Guilty of extravagancies 374the clergy were here, no doubt, as elsewhere; but on the whole their position was not unfavourable to the harmonious working of the state; and the history of the Anglosaxons is perhaps as little deformed as any by the ambition and power, and selfish class-interests of the clergy^[862]. On the other hand it cannot be denied that in England, as in other countries, the laity are under the greatest obligations to them, partly for rescuing some branches of learning from total neglect, and partly for the counterpoise which their authority presented to the rude and forcible government of a military aristocracy. Ridiculous as it would be to affirm that their influence was never exerted for mischievous purposes, or that this institution was always free from the imperfections and evils which belong to all human institutions, it would be still more unworthy of the dignity of history to affect to undervalue the services which they rendered to society. If in the pursuit of private and corporate advantages they occasionally seemed likely to prefer the separate to the general good, they did no more than all bodies of men have done,—no more than is necessary to ensure the active co-operation of all bodies of men in any one line of conduct. But, whatever their class-interests may from time 375to time have led them to do, let it be remembered that they existed as a permanent mediating authority between the rich and the poor, the strong and the weak, and that, to their eternal honour, they fully comprehended and performed the duties of this most noble position. To none but themselves would it have been permitted to stay the strong hand of power, to mitigate the just severity of the law, to hold out a glimmering of hope to the serf, to find a place in this world and a provision for the destitute, whose existence the state did not even recognize. That the church of Christ does not necessarily and indispensably imply that form of ministration or constitution called Episcopal, is certain; but on the other hand let us not listen too readily to the doctrine which represents episcopacy as inconsistent with Christianity. To put it only on the lowest grounds, there is great convenience in it; and though there are no peculiar priests under the Christian dispensation, it is very useful that there should be persons specially appointed and educated to perform functions necessary to the moral and religious training of the people, and superior officers charged with the inspection over those persons. It would be difficult for the State to ascertain the condition of its members, as regards the most important of all considerations,—their moral capability of obedience to the law,—without such a body of recognized ministers and recognized inspectors. Accordingly the Anglosaxon State at once recognized the Bishops as State officers.

376The circumstances under which the establishment of Christianity took place naturally threw a great power of superintendence and interference into the hands of the kings: from the beginning we find them taking a very active part both in the formation of sees, the appointment of bishops, and other public measures touching the government of the church and—within this—the relation of the clergy to the state. The privileges and rights conceded to the clerical body were granted by the king and his witan, and enjoyed under their guarantee; and down to the last moment of the Anglosaxon monarchy we find the episcopal elections or appointments to have been controlled by them. Indeed as the clergy, the people and the state may be said to have been duly represented by the Witena gemót, an episcopal election made by them appears to possess in all respects the genuine character of a canonical election: and in times when there were no parliamentary struggles to make single votes valuable, there seems no reason whatever to question that this mode was found satisfactory. The loose manner in which the early writers mention the appointment of the bishops, hardly permits us to draw any very definite conclusions; yet it would seem natural that, where the whole missionary work depended upon the goodwill of the king, the latter, with or without his council, would exercise a paramount authority in all matters of detail. Accordingly, though we do meet with instances in which the free election of prelates may be assumed, we do far more frequently find them both appointed 377and displaced by the mere act of the royal will^[863]. The case of Wessex in the seventh century is instructive. Ægilberht, a Frank, had succeeded Birinus, the first missionary bishop; but, from some cause or other, he lost the favour of the king^[864], who 378proposed to divide his diocese, which was too large in fact for one prelate, and to appoint Wini, a native Westsaxon, to the second see. Ægilberht then withdrew from England in disgust, and the king committed the undivided bishopric to Wini: but on some subsequent misunderstanding, this bishop was expelled from Wessex, and afterwards purchased the see of London from Wulfhari, king of the Mercians. Coinwalh then applied for and obtained another bishop from Gaul in the person of Liuthari or Lothaire, Ægilberht’s nephew. Equally great irregularities seem to have been admitted in respect to the Northumbrian sees in the time of Wilfrið; and indeed throughout the Anglosaxon history it appears that the ruling powers, that is the king and the witan, did in fact succeed in retaining the nomination of the bishops in their own hands^[865]. I have already mentioned instances of episcopal nominations by the witena gemót^[866], and called attention to the significant fact of so many royal chaplains promoted to sees^[867]. It is difficult no doubt to withstand a royal recommendation, and though in the case of the Anglosaxon prelates this does not always seem to have ensured the canonical virtues, it perhaps very sufficiently supplied their want. After the appointment or election had thus 379been made, it was usual for the bishop elect to make his profession of faith to his metropolitan; then to receive episcopal consecration from him, assisted by such of his suffragans as he thought fit. He then most likely received seizin of the temporalities in the usual way by royal writ. The following is the instrument issued in 1060, for the temporalities of the see of Hereford, on the appointment of Walther, queen Eádgyfu’s Lorraine chaplain. “Eadwardus rex saluto Haroldum comitem et Osbearnum, et omnes meos ministros in Herefordensi comitatu amicabiliter. Et ego notifico vobis quod ego concessi Waltero episcopo istum episcopatum hic vobiscum, et omnia universa illa quae ad ipsum cum iusticia pertinent infra portum et extra, cum saca et cum socna, tam plene et tam plane sicut ipsum aliquis episcopus ante ipsum prius habuit in omnibus rebus. Et si illic sit aliqua terra extra dimissa quae illuc intus cum iustitia pertinet, ego volo quod ipsa reveniat in ipsum episcopatum, vel ille homo ipsam dimittat eidem in suo praetio, si quis ipsam cum eo invenire possit. Et ego nolo ullum hominem licentiare quod ei de manibus rapiat aliquam suam rem quam ipse iuste habere debet, et ego ei sic concessi^[868].”

As this is obviously, indeed professedly, a Latin translation, I subjoin copies of the similar writs issued on the occasion of Gisa’s appointment to the see of Wells^[869].

380“✠ Eadward king grét Harold erl and Aylnóð abbot and Godwine schýre réuen and alle míne þeynes on Sumerseten frendlíche; and ich kýðe eów ðæt ich habbe geunnen Gisan mínan préste ðes biscopríche hér mid eów and alre ðare þinge ðás ðe ðǽr mid richte tógebyrað, on wóde and on felde, mid saca and mid sócna, binnon porte and bútan, swó ful and swó forð swó Duduc biscop oð ány biscop hit firmest him tóforen hauede on ællem þingan. And gif hér áni land sý out of ðám biscopríche gedon, ich wille ðæt hit cume in ongeæn óðer ðæt man hit ofgo on hire gemóð swó man wið him bet finde mage. And ich bidde eóu allen ðæt ge him fulstan tó dríuan Godes gerichte lóck huer hit neod sý and he eówwer fultumes biðurfe. And ich nelle nánne man geðefien ðæt him úram honde teó ánige ðáre þinge ðás ðe ich him unnen habben^[870].”

“✠ Eadward king grét Harold erl, and Aylnóð abbot, and Godwine and ealle míne þeines on Sumerseten frendlíche; ich queðe eóu ðæt ich wille ðæt Gyse biscop beó ðisses biscopríches wrðe heerinne mid eóu. And álch ðáre þinge ðe ðás ðár mid richte tógebyrað binnan porte and bután, mid saca and mid sócna, swó uol and swó uorð swó hit éni biscop 381him tóuoren formest haueð on ealle þing. And ich bidde eóu alle ðæt ge him beón on fultome Cristendóm tó sprekene, lóc whar hit þarf sý and eówer fultumes beðurfe eal swó ich getrowwen tó eów habben ðat ge him on fultume beón willen. And gif what sý mid unlage out of ðán biscopríche geydón sý hit londe óðer an oððer þinge ðár fulstan him uor mínan luuen ðæt hit in ongeyn cume swó swó ge for Gode witen ðat hit richt sý. God eú ealle gehealde^[871].”

The metropolitans themselves were to receive consecration from one another, in order that the expense and trouble of going to Rome might be avoided: but during the abeyance of the archiepiscopate of York, the prelate elect of Canterbury appears to have been sometimes consecrated in Gaul, sometimes by a conclave of suffragan bishops at home: thus in 731 Tátwine was consecrated at Canterbury by Daniel, Ingwald, Aldwine and Aldwulf, the respective bishops of Winchester, London, Worcester and Rochester^[872]; and Pope Gregory the Third either made or acknowledged this 382consecration to be valid by the transmission of a pall in 733. We have no evidence by whom the consecrations were performed, in many cases, but it is probable that the old rule was adhered to as much as possible. In 1020, Æðelnóð was consecrated to Canterbury by archbishop Wulfstán: the ceremony took place at Canterbury on the 13th of November^[873] in that year: and since in many cases the ordination of archbishops is mentioned without any details, but yet as preliminary to their going to Rome for their palls, it is likely that the chroniclers tacitly assumed the custom of reciprocal functions in Canterbury and York to be too well known to require description.

When the nomination or election by the king and his witan had taken place, it is probable that a royal mandate was sent to the metropolitan, to perform the ceremony of consecration. We have yet the instrument by which Wulfstán of York certifies to Cnut the performance of this duty in the case of archbishop Æðelnóð^[874]: the archbishop says:—“Wulfstán the archbishop greets Cnut his lord, and Ælfgyfu the lady, humbly: and I notify to you both, dear ones, that we have done as notice 383came from you to us respecting bishop Æðelwold, namely that we have now consecrated him.” He then prays that the new prelate may have all the rights and dues granted to him, which have been usual, and enjoyed by his predecessors: which perhaps is to be understood as a formal demand that the temporalities may be properly conferred upon him. There can be no manner of doubt as to the meaning of the word swutelung, which I have rendered by notice, and Lingard by order^[875]: it is a legal notification, and the technical word in a writ is swutelian. But I do not believe that Cnut was any more imperative in this matter than his predecessors had been. An Anglosaxon archbishop would never have found it a very safe thing to neglect a royal command by ancient right^[876].

The bishops were in fact officers of the administration, and whatever importance their ecclesiastical functions may have possessed, their civil character was not of less moment. It is abundantly 384obvious that men of such a class, possessing nearly a monopoly of what learning existed, would be necessarily called to assist in the national councils, and would be very generally employed in the diplomatic intercourse with foreign countries: few persons of equal rank would have been competent to conduct a negotiation carried on in writing: and there is no doubt that their high position in the universal institution of the church rendered them at that period the fittest persons to manage those affairs which concerned the general family of nations. Moreover a close alliance always existed in England between the aristocracy and the clergy: faithful service of the altar, like faithful service of the state, gave rank and dignity and privileges; and the ecclesiastical authority and influence of the bishop, as well as his habits of business, and general aptitude to advance the interests of the crown, frequently designated him to discharge the somewhat indefinite, but weighty, duties of what we now call a prime minister. Administration is in truth of such far greater importance than constitution, that we can readily see how greatly the social welfare of England did in reality depend upon this class, to whom so much of administrative detail was committed: and it was truly fortunate for the country that the clerical profession was one that a gentleman could devote himself to without disparagement, and therefore embraced so many distinguished members of the ruling class.

The civil and ecclesiastical jurisdictions were, it is well known, not separated in England until after 385the Conquest. William the Norman was the first to establish that most questionable division, the consequences of which were often so bitterly felt by his successors. Previous to his reign the bishop had been the assessor of the ealdorman in the scírgemót or county-court, and ecclesiastical causes, except such as were reserved for the decision of the episcopal synods, were subjected, like those of the laity, to the judgment of the scírþegnas or shire-thanes: thus even probate of wills was given in the county-court. This participation of bishops in the administration of justice, useful and necessary in the early ages of Christianity, was very probably derived from the functions of their heathen predecessors, the priests of the ancient gods. The old Germanic placita were held, as is well known, under the presidency of the priests, and these were courts of law as well as courts of parliament. In fact there is no reason whatever to doubt that, long before the introduction of Christianity, the public pleadings were opened with religious ceremonies, and that the course of procedure was regulated by religious ideas^[877]. The gods were present,—to secure the peaceful administration of justice, to sanction the finding of the freemen, to give a holy character to the act of doing right between man and man,—to terrify the perjurer and the criminal,—perhaps to justify the extreme penalty of the law in extreme cases; for it is probable that to the gods alone 386could the life of a great wrongdoer be offered, as an atonement to the Law, of which God is the root and guardian. The institution of the ordeal by which it was superstitiously supposed that the Almighty would reveal the hidden truth or falsehood of men, further tended to connect, first the pagan and afterwards the Christian priesthood with the administration of justice. In that most solemn appeal to the omniscience and justice of God, the clergy necessarily took the prominent part; and although we cannot believe that they always resisted the temptation offered by that most strange juggle, it may charitably be asserted that their intervention not rarely saved the innocent from the penal consequences of an uncertain and painful test.

I have remarked in an earlier chapter^[878] upon the union of the sacerdotal with the judicial power: at a very early stage of human society, the functions of the priest and the judge seem in general to have been inseparable; nor were they separated in fact upon the introduction of Christianity. In the very commencement of our æra, when the church really did exist as a brotherhood under the guidance of the first disciples, it was most natural that all contentions between members of the body should be settled by the arbitration of the whole church, or such as represented it. Litigation before the ordinary tribunals of the state, even could such have been resorted to by Christians, was little consonant with the doctrine of charity which was to prevail among 387the members of one mystical body, founded on almighty Love. Accordingly St. Paul himself^[879] expressly forbids the disciples to carry their contentions before the secular authorities, implying that it is their duty to bring them to the consideration of their fellow-believers, that they may be amicably settled, in the spirit of forbearance and Christian moderation. And as persecution gradually threatened the terrified community, this course became unavoidable: it was impossible for the Christian to submit to the pagan forms of the tribunals, yet to refuse these was to proclaim the adoption of a proscribed and illegal association. The establishment of a hierarchy among the Christians themselves supplied some remedy for this difficulty, and it was soon decided that the disputes of the brotherhood were to be brought before the presbyter or bishop as a judge,—a course which in itself was natural in countries where the Romans had permitted the existence of some authority in the national tribunals, and had not insisted upon dragging every cause before their own officers. The peculiar situation of the Christians themselves as citizens of a new state—viz. the religious state—tended to consolidate this system. Christianity took cognizance of motives, of acts entirely beyond the reach of mere human law, and the community claimed a right to judge of the internal as well as the external state of its members. Immorality, not cognizable by any positive law, was a proper subject for the animadversion 388of a body whose duty it was to exclude from communion all who pertinaciously refused to perform the duties of their profession. It was thus that a twofold jurisdiction became lodged in the church,—and in the bishop or presbyter, as its representative in each particular locality,—long before the reception of Christianity among the religiones licitae transformed the customs of an obscure sect into recognised laws of the empire. But no sooner had the terms of the great alliance been arranged, than the state hastened to give the imperial sanction to what had hitherto been merely the bye-laws of a sodality: and the decisions of a council, if confirmed by the assent of the emperor, were at once raised to the rank of imperial laws. Thus the council of Carthage in 397 had threatened with excommunication any clergyman who should pursue another before the secular tribunals; and this decree, repeated in 451 by the fourth general Council—that of Chalcedon—had received the sanction of Marcianus, and become part of the law of the Roman empire. The jurisdiction of the bishops in the affairs of the clergy was thus rendered legal; but it was at a later period extended so as to include a much wider sphere. Justinian not only commanded all causes in which monks were concerned to be referred to the bishop of the diocese, but made him the only legal channel of proceedings even in cases where laymen had claims against the clergy^[880].

Arbitration by the bishop had thus grown up 389into a custom, at first absolutely necessary, and afterwards always desirable, in a society like the Christian. Accordingly Constantine permitted all contentions to be so settled. But it was a rule of Roman law that there could lie no appeal whatever from a voluntary arbitration; and in pursuance of this rule, in the year 408, Arcadius and Honorius decreed that the sentences of bishops should be without appeal^[881]. In this manner was the ecclesiastical jurisdiction founded in the Greek and Roman empires.

Happily for ourselves, this could not be admitted without modification in the Germanic states. Had it indeed been so, every trace of independence would long since have perished, and the whole civilized world have found itself subject to the principles and regulations of an effete scheme of jurisprudence. The antagonism of the Germanic customary right it was that saved us from the consequences which must have followed the universal prevalence of maxims elaborated by another race, and sprung out of a different social condition. It was the conflict of the Roman and Ecclesiastical laws with those of the Teutonic victors that produced that modified system of relations, under which, by the blessing of Providence, civilization has been maintained, the general well-being of mankind advanced, and human society firmly established throughout Europe, on a basis susceptible of progressive, perhaps illimitable improvement. 390Useful as a counter-check to the somewhat disruptive system of the Germans, the Roman and Ecclesiastical laws have yet never been able to destroy the nationality, or abridge the freedom, of our races; while they have tended to give consistency and method to our own customs, and to reduce into form and harmony what, but for them, might have been liable to fall asunder from its own internal vigour. Like the centripetal and centrifugal forces, they have balanced one another, and held our social state together as one majestic and consistent whole.

The method of doing justice between man and man, which was the very foundation-stone of the Teutonic polity, was in direct opposition to the doctrines of Roman jurists and the practice of the church. Justice went out from among the people themselves, not from the king or the bishop. The people spoke both as to fact and law, the ancient customary law; nor did they at any time allow their relations as Christians to abrogate the older rights they had possessed as citizens, where the exercise of these was clearly compatible with the recognition of the former. In respect to their religion, they duly submitted to the ecclesiastical authority, made confession, performed penance, and hearkened to advice tendered by qualified functionaries; but they nevertheless still met in their folk- and shire-moots to hold plea, declare folk-right, and superintend its execution by their national officers. Not even to the clergy themselves did they accord an immunity from the universal duties 391of freemen: and although they may have been disposed to acquiesce in the claim to be quit of personal military service, they never excused suit and service to the popular courts. Only when the relation of a cleric to his superior was that of an unfree man to his lord, did the state release him from this duty, or rather did the state hold him unworthy of this privilege.

The existence of such a body as the English clergy could not possibly be ignored. As organized agents of a system which professed to exercise a right of rule over the most secret desires and motives of men,—as students distinguished by their knowledge, or remarkable for their piety,—as landlords, in the enjoyment of great wealth, and chiefs of numerous dependents,—lastly as advisers and ministers of the ruling class, or intermediaries in the intercourse with foreign states,—they formed a power whose claims to attention could not be neglected. But their social position itself was that which brought them continually in relation with the other aggregates of freemen, and they were therefore called upon to take their place with other landowners, lords, or ministerials in the popular councils.

With all their attachment to the customary law and the national franchises, the Anglosaxons never lost sight of the fact that Christianity had introduced new social relations: they were ready to admit that there was now a godcund or divine as well as woroldcund or secular right; and in the exposition of the former they were willing to follow the 392guidance of those who professed to make it their especial study. Moreover the system of Anglosaxon jurisprudence depended very much upon the trustworthy character of witnesses, and the ordination of the clergy was justly taken to have imposed upon them the obligation of a peculiar truthfulness. The testimony of members of their class became therefore a very important thing in the sight of the moot-thanes who might have disputed points to settle, or who, in mixed causes, might shrink from doing wrong to the venerable body by too strict an application of the principles by which themselves were bound. Lastly, as there was a merciful tendency among the people to have disputes settled by arbitration and on equitable grounds, rather than by the strict rules of law, the clergy, whose jurisdiction extended to the motives of Christians rather than the mere acts of citizens, were valuable intermediaries between contending parties. The dignity of the class—the honor clericalis—was cheerfully recognised, the wisdom and goodness of the body acknowledged, and the propriety of being to a great degree guided by the experience and enlightenment of their leaders, readily conceded. Accordingly the bishop became an inseparable assessor of the Frankish count and of the Anglosaxon ealdorman in their respective courts^[882].

The duties of a bishop as the officer of a state, and contradistinguished from his merely ecclesiastical 393functions, were to assist in the administration of justice between man and man, to guard against perjury, and to superintend the administration of the ordeals; further to take care that no fraud was committed by means of unjust measures, to which end he was made the guardian of the standards, and the judge of what work might be demanded from the serf; above all, to watch over the maintenance of the peace, and the upholding of divine as well as secular law^[883]. The canons of the church did indeed prohibit the presence of bishops on trials which might involve the penalties of death or mutilation; and even the Constitutions of Clarendon, 394the object of which was to place the clergy on their proper and ancient footing towards the other members of the church and state, recognised this exemption^[884]: but there is little reason to suppose that it was regarded by the Anglosaxons; indeed the popular courts had no power to pass sentences of so deep a dye, until long after the custom of the bishop’s presence therein had been established too firmly to be questioned. It was otherwise among the Franks, and we may perhaps attribute this to the strong nationality of the Frankish clergy, which indisposed them to claim their canonical immunity.

Another exemption which the bishops properly possessed, seems also to have been often neglected in this country,—that namely of personal service in the field. No doubt, all over Europe, as soon as the bishops became possessed of lands liable to the hereban, or military muster, they, like other lords, were compelled to place their armed tenants on foot, for the public service, when duly required: but their levies were mostly commanded by officers specially designated for that purpose and known under the names of advocati, vicedomini, or vidames; being in general nobles of power and dignity who assumed or accepted the exercise of the bishop’s royalties, the management of his estates, the administration and execution of his justice, and a remunerative 395share of his revenues and patronage. In Saxon England, however, we do not meet with these officers; and though it is probable that the bishop’s geréfa was bound to lead his contingent under the command of the ealdorman, yet we have ample evidence that the prelates themselves did not hold their station to excuse them from taking part in the just and lawful defence of their country and religion against strange and pagan invaders^[885]. Too many fell in conflict to allow of our attributing their presence on the field merely to their anxiety lest the belligerents should be without the due consolations of religion; and in other cases, upon the alarm of hostile incursions, we find the levies stated to have been led against the enemy by the duke and bishop of the district.

Attention has been called in another chapter to the fact that the bishops did not universally (or indeed usually), make their residences in the principal cities^[886]. A remarkable distinction thus arose between themselves and the prelates of Gaul and Germany. The latter, strong in the support of the burgesses, and identified with the urban interests, found means to consolidate a power which they used without scruple against the king when it suited their convenience, or which enabled them to extort from him the grant of offices that virtually rendered them independent of his authority. This 396was generally effected through the bishop’s obtaining the county, that is becoming the count, and thus exercising the palatine power in his city, as well as that which he might already possess iure episcopii, and as defensor urbis or patron of the municipality. This, rare indeed under Charlemagne, but not uncommon in the times which preceded and followed him, can at least not be proved to have taken place in England before the Conquest^[887]. There is indeed one instance which might seem at first sight to contradict this assertion, but which upon closer investigation rather confirms it. We learn that certain thieves, having attempted a sacrilegious entry into the church of St. Eádmund, and being miraculously delivered into the hands of the authorities, were put to death by the orders of Ðeódred, then bishop of London and of Eastanglia^[888]. This event took place after the conquest of the last-named province by Æðelstán, who about 930 drove the Danes from it or reduced them under his own power. At that time it appears uncertain whether the conquered kingdom had been duly arranged 397and settled, or whether any ealdorman had been appointed to govern it. If not, we must imagine that Ðeódred, the only constituted authority on the spot, acted at his own discretion in a case of urgency, without absolutely possessing the legal power to do so; that the act was in short one of those examples of what in modern times we understand by the term Lynch-law, that law which men are obliged to administer for themselves in the absence of the regular machinery of government. But it is further observable that, according to the terms of the legend itself, these thieves were taken in the manner, and consequently liable to capital punishment without any trial at all^[889]; this justice we may suppose Ðeódred to have executed, and to its summary character we may attribute the regrets he expressed on the subject at a later time. It is also possible to account for the act by supposing that even at this early period the bishop possessed his sacu and sócn in the demesne of St. Eádmund, and that he proceeded to execute his thieves by his right as lord of the sócn: but there is no clear proof that the immunity did exist before the time of Cnut, and I therefore incline to the second explanation as the most probable. But if Ðeódred did not act in pursuance of possessing the comitial power, we may safely say that there is no evidence 398whatever of any Saxon bishop having exercised it^[890]. As assessor to the ealdorman, the bishop was especially charged to attend to the due levy of tithe and other church imposts; but this was clearly because he had a direct interest in the law that decreed their punctual payment, and was certain not to connive at any neglect in its execution, which the ealdorman out of favour or carelessness might possibly have been disposed to do.

But a still higher authority was placed in the hands of the bishop, derived in fact from the assumed pre-eminence of the ecclesiastical over the secular power. If the geréfa would not do justice, and maintain the peace in the land, then the bishop was especially commanded to enforce the fines which the king and his witan had apportioned to that officer’s offence^[891]. It was no doubt argued that no geréfa would be found bold enough to incur the danger of offering violent resistance to the sacred person of the prelate; and even the ealdorman, who 399might have set the king at defiance, would tremble to encounter the substantial terrors of excommunication and a laborious penance.

The high station occupied by the bishop in the social hierarchy is proved by the amount of his wergyld and of the fines assigned to offences against his honour, his person, and his property. Although the bishop and the presbyter are in fact but of one order in the church, yet the state found it convenient to place the former on much the higher scale. In the “North-people’s law” an archbishop is reckoned upon the same footing as an æðeling or prince of the blood, at fifteen thousand thrymsas, and a bishop upon the same footing as an ealdorman at eight thousand. The breach of a bishop’s surety or protection, like the ealdorman’s, rendered the offender liable to a fine of two pounds, which in the case of an archbishop rose to three^[892]. He that drew weapon before a bishop or ealdorman was to be mulcted in one hundred shillings, before an archbishop, in one hundred and fifty^[893]. Under Ini the violence done to a bishop’s dwelling, and the seat of his jurisdiction, was to be compensated with one hundred and twenty shillings, while the ealdorman’s was protected by a fine of only eighty: in this the episcopal dignity was placed upon a level with that of the king himself^[894]. Similarly Wihtrǽd 400had declared his mere word, without an oath, to be like the king’s, incontrovertible.

The ecclesiastical functions of the bishops were here the same as elsewhere. To them belonged the ordination of priests and deacons, the hallowing of chrism, the ceremonies of confirmation, the consecration of churches and churchyards, nuns and monks; they had a right to regulate the lives and conversation of their clergy, to superintend the monastic foundations, and in general to watch that every detail of the ecclesiastical establishment was duly regarded and maintained. In their peculiar synods they could frame canons of discipline, to be enforced in the several dioceses. They were the receivers-general of all ecclesiastical revenue, which they distributed to the inferior clergy under their government, according to certain specified regulations; providing out of the common fund for the due maintenance of the priests, the buildings, and minor accessories required for decent celebration of the rites of religion.^[895]

But the most important of their functions was that which is technically called iurisdictio fori interni, their jurisdiction in matters of conscience, their dealing with the motives and feelings, rather than the acts of men. This—which practically they exercised through the several presbyters who were, for the general convenience, dispersed over 401the face of the country,—was the true source of their power, and measure of their social influence. Positive law deals only with the actions of men, and then only when they are perfected or completed: religion regulates the inward impulses from which those actions spring, and its authority extends both before and beyond them: intention, not act, is its proper province. But the secret intentions and motives of men are known perfectly to God alone; the man himself may, and often does possess but an indistinct and fallacious notion of his own impulses; and as it is in these, rather than in the acts which are their results, that the essence of guilt lies, the Christian was taught to unbosom himself to one of more experienced and disciplined feelings;—one whose profession was to console the distracted sinner, and who, on genuine repentance, was empowered to announce the glad tidings of reconciliation with God. Confession of sins was the mode pointed out by the founder of the church, to obtain the blessings of almighty mercy; but how were the ignorant, the obstinate, or the despairing to know the right manner of such confession? How could they know in what form confession was effectually to be made to God? How could they, plunged in sin and foulness, dare to approach the source of all purity and holiness? What hope could the grovelling outcast have of being admitted to the throne of his glorious King, even for the purpose of renouncing his state of rebellion and apostasy? But the glorious King was a merciful sovereign, who had commissioned certain of his 402servants, reconciled sinners themselves, to be intermediaries between his own majesty and the terror-stricken offender: they had been sent forth armed with full power to receive the submission which the guilty feared to offer to Himself in person, furnished with instructions as to the exact mode in which the satisfactory propitiation was to be made. These commissioners were the especial body of the clergy,—the successors and representatives of the Levitical Priests under the Law,—the offerers of the sacrifices,—to whom the spirit of God had been exclusively communicated in the ceremony of their ordination, and who thereby became possessors of the divine authority, to bind and loose, to forgive sins on earth and in the world to come. The clergy therefore undertook to direct the suffering and heart-broken outlaw to the throne of peace. Again, as the merely human preacher of atonement possessed of himself no means of ascertaining the genuineness of repentance, a system of penances was established which might serve as a test of the penitent’s earnestness: and too soon a miserable error grew up that, by submitting to self-inflicted punishments, the sinner might diminish the weight of the penalties which he had earned in a future state. But he might exceed or fall short of the just measure, if not duly weighed and apportioned by those who were in possession of the divine will in that respect: men had even without their own knowledge become holy and justified by their works of self-abasement and humiliation and charity: such men might exceed the necessary 403limit of penance and mortification:—happily for the sinner and the saint, the priest had a code of instructions at hand by which the difficulties in all cases could be readily adjusted.

These codes of instructions, known by the names of Confessionalia, Poenitentialia, Modus imponendi Poenitentiam, and the like, were compiled by the bishops, to whom the iurisdictio fori interni was exclusively competent, as soon as the episcopal system became firmly settled. The presbyter exercised it only as the bishop’s vicar, when it became inconvenient for the penitent to visit a distant cathedral or metropolis. The episcopal right was open to every bishop: each one might, if he dared, embody his own ideas on the subject in a code, which would derive its authority from conformity to the recognised customs of the church, the personal reputation of its author, and the general acceptance by his episcopal peers throughout the world. The differing circumstances of differing states of society required skilful adaptation of general rules; and therefore any bishop who felt in his conscience that he was qualified for the task, might bring the light of his wisdom to the consideration of this weighty matter, and make such regulations as to himself seemed good, for the management of his own diocese,—certain that, if the blessing of God rested upon his endeavours, his views would be widely circulated and adopted by his neighbours. There is perhaps no more melancholy evidence in existence of the vanity and worthlessness of human endeavours than the celebrated works which thus 404arose in various parts of Europe; and nothing can demonstrate more strikingly the folly and wickedness of squaring and shaping the unlimited mercy of God by the rule and measure of mere human intelligence. With the contents of these Poenitentials we have of course not here to deal; but I am bound to say that I know of no more fatal sources of antichristian error, no more miserable records of the debasement and degradation of human intellect, no more frightful proofs of the absence of genuine religion. It was the evil tendency of those barbarous early ages not to be satisfied with the simple promises of divine mercy, and faith was clouded and confused by the crowd of incongruous images which were raised between itself and its all-glorious object. At one time terrified by the consciousness of sin, at another deluded by the cheap hope of ceremonial justification, the human race eagerly rushed to multiply the means of salvation, and franticly rejoiced in the establishment of a host of mediators between themselves and their crucified Redeemer, between the frightened but unconverted sinner, and his offended Lord and Maker. The pure Word of God was not then, as it now is, accessible to every reader; and those whose duty it was to proclaim what the mass of men could not obtain access to themselves, had erred into a devious labyrinth of traditions, through which the weary wayfarer circled and circled in endless, objectless gyrations, at every turn more distant only from the goal he pursued. Pure and good were no doubt the objects sought by Cummian, and 405Theodore and Ælfríc, and pious the spirit in which they wrought; but the foundation of their house was upon sand, and when the rains fell and the tempests roared around it vanished in a moment from before the sight of God and man, never to be reconstructed, even until the closing of the ages.

The sources of revenue by which the bishops supported their temporal power will be considered in a subsequent chapter: it is enough that we find them to have been amply endowed with fitting means, in every part of Europe. During the Anglosaxon period, poverty and self-denial were not the characteristics of the class, however they may have distinguished certain members of the body. Nor will the philosophical enquirer see cause for regret in this: far more will he rejoice in the establishment of any system which tends to draw closer the bonds of intercourse between the clerical and lay members of the church, which leads to the identification of their worldly as well as their eternal interests, and unites them in one harmonious work of praise and thanksgiving, one active service of worship and charity and love, before the face of Him in whom they are united as one holy priesthood. It is the separation of the clergy from the laity, as a class, to which the world owes so many ages of misery and error; and to the comparative union of both orders in the church, we may perhaps attribute the general quiet which, in these respects, characterized the Anglosaxon polity. On these points of separation I shall also have something to say hereafter; but for the present one 406more subject alone remains to be treated of in this chapter, the last but not least remarkable function of the episcopal authority and power. By far the most important point of the public ecclesiastical jurisdiction,—for the iurisdictio fori interni is quite another thing,—lay in the questions of marriage, which were especially reserved for the bishop’s cognizance. The prohibitions which the clergy enforced were obviously unknown to the strict Teutonic law, which permitted considerable licence in these respects. From Tacitus we learn that a sort of polygamy was not unknown on the part of the princes; it was probably looked upon as a useful mode of increasing the alliances of the tribe^[896],—the only conceivable ground on which it could have been allowed by a race so strict in the observance of marriage. We do not know within what degrees the Germans permitted unions which the Roman clergy considered incestuous, but we do know that Gregory considered a relaxation of the strict rule necessary to the success of Augustine in Britain; that he gave the missionary positive instructions upon the subject, and, when blamed by his episcopal brother of Messina for this concession, justified his course by the danger which he apprehended for his plan of conversion, if the prejudices of the Saxons on so vital a point were too hastily shocked^[897]. 407From these directions of Gregory we learn not only that the marriage of first cousins was common, but—what is much more surprising—that the marriage with a father’s widow was so likewise. Nor can we doubt this, when we not only find recorded cases of its occurrence, but when we have a Teutonic king distinctly affirming it to be the legal custom of his people: in the sixth century Ermengisl king of the Varni can say, “Let Radiger my son marry his step-mother, even as our national custom permits^[898];” and therefore when we find Beda speaking of a similar marriage, and declaring Eádbald to have been “fornicatione pollutus tali qualem nec inter gentes auditam Apostolus testatur, 408ita ut uxorem patris haberet^[899],” or Asser on another such occasion saying that it was “contra Dei interdictum, et Christianorum dignitatem, nec non et contra omnium Paganorum consuetudinem,” we can only suppose that they either did not know, or that they deemed it advisable not to recognise, the ancient heathen practice.

In both the cases referred to, the obvious scandal was put a stop to by the separation of the parties^[900],—Eádbald being evidently led to this step by superstitious fears, rather than submitting to an episcopal authority exercised by Laurentius. It is certainly strange in the case of Æðelbald, if there really were a separation, that we hear nothing of the interference of the Church to produce so important an event.

409We learn that by degrees the time arrived at which the clergy thought themselves strong enough to insist upon a stricter observance of the canonical prohibitions, and various instances are on record where their intervention is mentioned, to separate persons too nearly connected by blood. It is probable that many more of these are intended than we actually know; for unhappily the monkish writers are over-fond of using strong expressions both of praise and blame, and not rarely fling pellex scortum and concubina at the heads of women who were for all that, legally speaking, very honest wives. One celebrated case has obtained a worldwide reputation,—that of Eádwig, the details of whose unhappy fate will probably for ever remain a mystery. Political calculations, and unreconciled national jealousies were in all probability the mainsprings of the events of his troublous life; but that which lends it all its romance—his separation from Ælfgyfu—was the act of a prelate determined upon upholding the ecclesiastical law of marriage. It is to be regretted that we do not know the exact degree of relationship between the royal victims. It may have been too close, in the eyes of the stricter clergy; yet we cannot close our eyes to the fact that it was long acquiesced in by the English nobles; nor, had Eádwig shown himself more pliant to the pretensions of Dúnstán, might we ever have heard of it at all. History, deprived of all its materials, will here fail to do even late justice to the sufferers; but it will not fail to stamp with its enduring brand the brutal conduct of their persecutors^[901]. 410However conscientious may have been the intentions of archbishop Oda, it is to be lamented 411that a stain of barbarous cruelty attaches to his memory, for the part he took in this transaction. It 412he found it inevitable, after two years of wedded life further to humiliate his already humbled sovereign, by insisting upon the removal of his young consort, it was not necessary to disfigure her with hot searing-irons, or on her return from exile to put her to a cruel death. The asceticism of the savage churchman seems here to have been embittered by even less worthy considerations.

The history of mediæval Europe show’s with what awful effect this tremendous power was wielded by unscrupulous popes and prelates, whenever it suited their purposes not to connive at marriages which, according to their teaching, were incestuous. But amidst the striking cases on record—the cases of kings and nobles—we look in vain for a true measure of the misery which these prohibitions must have entailed upon the humbler members of society, who possessed neither the influence to compel nor the wealth to purchase dispensations from an arbitrary and oppressive rule. The sense and feeling of mankind at once revolt against restrictions for which neither the law of God, nor the dictates of nature supply excuse, and which resting upon a 413complicated calculation of affinity, were often the means of betraying the innocent and ignorant into a condition of endless wretchedness. But they were invaluable engines of extortion, and instruments of malice; they led to the intervention of the priest with the family, in the most intolerable form; they furnished weapons which could be used with almost irresistible effect against those whom nothing could reach but the tears perhaps and broken heart of a beloved companion. And therefore they were steadily upheld till the great day of retribution came, which involved so many traditions of superstition and error, so many engines of oppression and fraud, in one common and undistinguishing ruin: τὰ πρὶν δὲ πελώρια νῦν ἀϊστοῖ—things mighty indeed have perished away from the world; but thrice blessed was the day which left us free and unshackled to pursue the noblest and purest impulses of our human nature.

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