To most of these were made perpetual processions, led by the Clergy in their rich attire. From the basins of gold or the bright florins of the King to the mite of the beggar, all fell into the deep insatiable box which unlocked its treasures to the Clergy. Besides all these estates, tithes, oblations, bequests to the Clergy and the monasteries, reckon the subsidies in kind to the Mendicants in their four Orders—Dominicans, Franciscans, Augustinians, Carmelites. In every country of Latin Christendom, of these swarms of Friars, the lowest obtained sustenance: the higher, means to build up and maintain splendid churches, cloisters, houses. They were a vast standing army, far more vast than any maintained by any kingdom in Christendom: at once levying subsidies to an enormous amount and living at free quarters throughout the land.” Any investigation into the conditions of monastic life brings the reader into many strange and unexpected places. At first, probably, he is impatient over the futility of the life, the loss of the old ideals, the worship of a Rule which is broken away and disregarded at every point, the contrast between the profession of sanctity and the life of idleness. Presently, he begins to understand that at its worst the monastery always presented some kind of example, if only in its freedom from violence, and in a discipline, lax perhaps, but far more severe than could be found outside. And then he observes how much was done by the monastery, and how much was expected of it. I do not suppose that the indiscriminate charity enjoined upon the brethren, and always practised by them, was favourable to the repression of mendicity, and the discouragement of the tramp and masterless man. Still there is always the immediate need of the starving and the sick and the suffering, which should be met without too jealous questioning into records and antecedents. We need not ask what contributions to Mediæval Literature and Learning were made by this or that convent: it is enough to know that here was a Library, and that here the monks set up reading boxes in their cloisters for those who wished to study. The example was there. We need not ask how far the town folk or the village folk were admitted to the monastery school, or if it was used only for the children of noble parents confided to the Abbot for education. The school was there, it was an example. We need not, even, pry too closely into the private lives of the Religious, though I think that as a rule they were as blameless as could be expected, considering the time and the manners: the example was there: the rule of chastity, temperance, obedience, and contempt of wealth.