Short Studies on Great SubjectsFroude, James Anthony
Religion
Short Studies on Great Subjects
Froude, James Anthony
English essays; English literature; History; Religion -- Biography
Nor is Bray the only house into which you have introduced disorder.
At the nunnery of Sapwell, which you also contend to be under your
jurisdiction, you change the prioresses and superiors again and
again at your own will and caprice. Here, as well as at Bray, you
depose those who are good and religious; you promote to the highest
dignities the worthless and the vicious. The duties of the order are
cast aside; virtue is neglected; and by these means so much cost and
extravagance has been caused, that to provide means for your
indulgence you have introduced certain of your brethren to preside
in their houses under the name of guardians, when in fact they are
no guardians, but thieves and notorious villains; and with their
help you have caused and permitted the goods of the same priories to
be dispensed, or to speak more truly to be dissipated, in the
above-described corruptions and other enormous and accursed
offences. Those places once religious are rendered and reputed as it
were profane and impious; and by your own and your creatures'
conduct, are so impoverished as to be reduced to the verge of ruin.
In like manner, also, you have dealt with certain other cells of
monks, which you say are subject to you, even within the monastery
of the glorious proto-martyr Alban himself. You have dilapidated the
common property; you have made away with the jewels; the copses, the
woods, the underwood, almost all the oaks, and other forest trees,
to the value of eight thousand marks and more, you have made to be
cut down without distinction, and they have by you been sold and
alienated. The brethren of the abbey, some of whom, as is reported,
are given over to all the evil things of the world, neglect the
service of God altogether. They live with harlots and mistresses
publicly and continuously, within the precincts of the monastery and
without. Some of them, who are covetous of honour and promotion, and
desirous therefore of pleasing your cupidity, have stolen and made
away with the chalices and other jewels of the church. They have
even sacrilegiously extracted the precious stones from the very
shrine of St. Alban; and you have not punished these men, but have
rather knowingly supported and maintained them. If any of your
brethren be living justly and religiously, if any be wise and
virtuous, these you straightway depress and hold in hatred.... You
...
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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