SKETCH MAP OF STAFFORDSHIRE _end of book_ The Dissolution of the Monasteries CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION In one of the earlier chapters of a brilliantly written history[1] dealing with the sixteenth century the glory of English hospitality is enlarged upon. It was a time, we are told, “when every door was opened to a request for a meal or a night’s lodging,” and among other examples we are given the instance that “two hundred poor were fed daily at the house of Thomas Cromwell.” Moreover, we are assured that “there was little fear of an abuse of such license.” Yet presently we find the monasteries censured in the severest language for their demoralising charity, and picturesquely and forcibly condemned as “nurseries of dishonest mendicancy.” No explanation is vouchsafed as to why the alms of the monks were more demoralising than those of the nobles. This is a good illustration of the way the whole subject of the Dissolution of the Monasteries has been often treated. Sentiment and prejudice enter largely, and perhaps inevitably, into the whole subject. Even so prosaic an aspect as the financial one has given occasion for the most contradictory opinions. The vast possessions of the monasteries, their enormous wealth, the large immunities from taxation which they enjoyed, their robbery of the parish churches, have all been dilated upon for three centuries and a half. The monastic income, where figures have been given, ranges from Speed’s £171,300 to Burnet’s £131,607. Abbot Gasquet says the monastic lands amounted to two million acres. A Jacobite pamphleteer of 1717 asserted that the monks possessed seven-tenths of the whole land: more sober writers have estimated less extravagantly. J. R. Green said it was a fifth, and Dr. Gairdner says a third. Writers have often told of “hordes of idle men and women” in the religious houses. Dr. Gasquet affirms that the number was 8,081, with “more than ten times that number of people who were their dependents or otherwise obtained a living in their service:” the total population of England being some four millions, this gives a proportion of one in forty-three. It is obvious that there remains much to be desired in the way of definiteness and exactness on many points. The following pages are an attempt to do something in this direction by investigating facts and by going to the fountain head. All unsupported statements and mere opinions have been rigorously disregarded: they are generally, and sometimes obviously, guesswork only. The actual figures of authoritative documents alone have been dealt with. In this way it is hoped that some conclusions have been reached which rest upon solid foundations.