The rights and privileges of Holy Church were jealously guarded by the Parliament of Kilkenny. Persons excommunicated for infringing her franchises were to be imprisoned by the civil power until restitution was made. Tithes were specially protected, and the excommunicated were not to be countenanced by King or people. But the distinction between the hostile races was maintained in matters ecclesiastical. No Irishman was to be admitted by provision, collation, or presentation among the English. Such preferments were declared void, and the next presentation was to lapse to the Crown. Religious houses situated among the English were strictly forbidden to receive Irishmen, but Englishmen by birth and by blood were given equal rights. The Irish prelates present probably found no difficulty in accepting these principles, for they might, and did, retaliate by refusing to receive English clerks in Irish districts. The Archbishops and Bishops assembled at Kilkenny lent a special sanction to the statute by agreeing to excommunicate all who broke it, and they declared such offenders duly excommunicated in advance. [Sidenote: Effects of the Statute of Kilkenny.] Sir John Davies, with less than his usual accuracy, has declared that 'the execution of these laws, together with the presence of the King's son, made a notable alteration in the state and manners of the people within the space of seven years, which was the term of this prince's lieutenancy.' Now, the Statute of Kilkenny was not passed till 1367, and Lionel died in 1368. The Act of Henry III., on which Davies chiefly founded his statement, says the land continued in prosperity and honour while the Kilkenny laws were executed, and fell to ruin and desolation upon their falling into abeyance. But the annalists tell a different story, and it is not easy to say what those fat years were. In 1370, only three years after the passing of the much vaunted statute, the Earl of Desmond and others were taken prisoners by the O'Briens and Macnamaras, and the deputy, Sir William de Windsor, was obliged to leave the O'Tooles unchastised in order to hurry to the defence of Munster. Newcastle, within a day's ride from Dublin, was taken and dismantled. The judges could not get as far as Carlow. In 1377 the O'Farrells gained a great advantage over the English of Meath. The general result of the fighting during the ten years which followed the Parliament of Kilkenny was that the Irish retained possession of at least all which they had previously won. What the statute really did was to separate the two races more completely. [Sidenote: Edward III. weakens the colony by drawing men from it.]