manded to be governed by the laws of King Edward the Confessor; and the laws of this king were no other than the Saxonic laws of his predecessor, varied perhaps in some circumstances, according to the exigency of the present times. And I take the laws of King Henry I. to be a collection or system of such laws, drawn up in compliance with the most importunate clamours of his people.

Some of these old Saxonic laws, which were, one would think, least of all agreeable to the mind of the king, are there to be found; as that a clergyman if he have not married, and wholly abandoned himself to a secular way of living, shall be tried by his bishop only, for any crime, great or small, c. 57. Somner in his MS. notes calls this Becket's law; and from thence concludes that additions have been made to these laws since that archbishop's death: yet I do not think this a just conclusion: for the collection of Edward the Confessor's laws in the former volume, bearing date there 1064, (law 3 and 5,) do expressly give this privilege to clergymen. Among many penances inflicted by these laws, there is a penance assigned particularly for killing men in battle, or in defence of one's natural lord, c. 68. Nay, in opposition to popes, councils, and the mandate of the Conqueror, the bishop is again required to sit in the county court, c. 7 and 31. Countenance is given to making appeals to Rome in some cases, c. 5. And this was every now and then practised in the Saxonic times; but it never grew into a settled course of proceeding, till Henry of Winchester introduced it, by being legate constantly resident here in England. The only law that concerns the Church, and which seems perfectly new, to my observation at least, is that in c. 89, where he that is impeached for murdering father, mother, &c., if he denies it, is obliged to undergo the ordeal of walking over heated ploughshares. This is there called a Salic law *.]

* [For the laws of King Henry the First, see Thorpe, Ancient Laws and Institutes. They are also in Lambard's

Archæonomia, ed. Wheloc, and Wilkins, Leges Anglo-Saxonicæ.]

PREFACE TO ANSELM'S CANONS AT WESTMINSTER.

DURING the unhappy reign of William Rufus there was no ecclesiastical synod, and nothing went right. Lanfranc, having sat above eighteen years in the archbishop's chair, died in the year 1089, and the see remained vacant near five years. And though Anselm was consecrated toward the end of the year 1093, yet he had no time for regulating the Church. He had first a long contention with the king (William Rufus) which he maintained with great fierceness and obstinacy, concerning his receiving the pall from Pope Urban, whom the king did not acknowledge to be duly elected. Afterwards he was engaged in a dispute with the same prince and his brother and successor Henry I. concerning the right of investiture: for bishops here in England, as well as in other Churches, used to receive a ring and pastoral staff from the king upon their doing homage to him before their consecration. This practice seems to have been introduced by the see of Rome. For Pope Adrian in a synod anno Dom. 786*, gave Charles the Great power to elect the future popes, and determined that archbishops and bishops should receive investiture from him, and forbad any to be consecrated under pain of anathema, that were not so invested, and these facts stand recorded in the body of the canon law. Dist. lxiii. c. 22, 23. And though the same was done again near a hundred years after by Pope Leo to Otho, yet by Anselm's time the popes had repented of their predecessor's easiness, and this practice of princes was called the heresy of investitures, and bishops in many places refused to take the staff and ring from kings; for it was thought inconsistent with their spiritual authority, which they received from the pope only under Christ. By means of these heats, Anselm spent most of the sixteen years of his primacy in banishment abroad or in conflicts at home; and the generality of the bishops stood with the king, and against the archbishop in these points. However, he assembled a synod for the reformation of the Church.

["It is mentioned earlier in the life of Romanus, Bp. of Rouen, 623, who received the staff from Clovis II.

Burnet, Rt. of Princes, p. 174." MS. note Wrangham.]

LATIN. Sir H.

Spelman, vol. ii.

23.

A.D. MCII.

ANSELM'S CANONS AT WESTMINSTER.

IN St. Peter's church on the west side of London, (i. e. Westminster,) this Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury, a Girard, archbishop of York, and other bishops and abbots, with the [Wilkins, consent of the king and principal men of the whole realm; the archbishop met in synod petitioning they might be present, to the intent that what was done might be more unanimously observed; especially, because for long want of synods Christian zeal was grown cold, says Malmsbury*. In this

vol. i.

p. 382.]

synod three great abbots were deposed for simony, three that had not yet been consecrated were turned out of their abbeys, and three others were deprived for other crimes, though several of them were afterwards restored by dint of money, and farther it was decreed,

a Thomas his predecessor attended Lanfranc of Canterbury in five councils, says a MS. in the Cotton library, Sir H. Spelman, p. 15. In the first copy of Sir H. Spelman, eleven bishops are mentioned; among them, Herveus bishop of Banchor, the first Welsh bishop that I ever observed present in an English council.

[We are not to look on this as the beginning of a coalition between the [Addenda.] English and Welsh Church, (which yet seems to have been brought about within twenty-five years from this time,) but Herveus pretended to have come hither as to a place of refuge, having been ejected from his see by secular violence; but he was suspected to aim at an English bishopric, and he obtained one. On the death of the last abbot of Ely the king granted to him the custody of that abbacy; and he so effectually ingratiated with the monks as to gain their consent to have their abbacy erected into a bishopric. The king and pope approve of their design, and confirm it. The bishop of Lincoln would not permit his diocese to be dismembered till they purchased his consent with a good manor. Thus Herveus founded the see of Ely, and became first bishop there. The monks found reason to repent of their easiness, for in separating the estate between himself and them (which was now the general practice) he left only the barren and worthless part of the lands to the monks. In this and other particulars, he shewed himself unworthy of the kindness they had shewed him.]

The archbishop ordained two others at this assembly, viz., Roger the king's chancellor to Salisbury, and Roger his larderer to Hereford; but he died at London presently after his consecration.

1. That bishops do not keep secular courts of pleas, that they be appareled not as laymen but as becomes religious persons, and have honest men to bear testimony to their conversation.

2. That archdeaconries be not let to farm.

3. That archdeacons be deacons.

4. That no archdeacon, priest, deacon, or canon marry a

tiis, pro sua quisque causa, Richardus de Heli, et Robertus de Sancto Edmundo, et qui erat apud Micelenei.

II. Statutum quoque est, ne episcopi secularium placitorum officium suscipiant;" &c. Wilkins, vol. i. p. 382.

In the first as well as the remaining

canons, Wilkins, quoting from Ead-
mer, agrees with Spelman's second
copy, of which Johnson's is a fair
translation, except in the first canon
relating to simony, which Johnson
abridges and makes part of the pre-
face.]

wife, or retain her if he be married. That every subdeacon be under the same law though he be not a canon, cif he hath married a wife after he had made profession of chastity.

b The reader by comparing this and the sixth and seventh canon with the first of Lanfranc's, 1076, will see how the zeal of the prelates of this age against the clergy's marriage was improved in less than thirty years' time. They well knew that a married clergy could never turn slaves to the pope against the civil power, which was the chief aim of Anselm and his adherents.

By this it appears that there were some subdeacons yet alive who had taken that order, before men were obliged to profess chastity at the receiving of it and well might they content themselves with it, while this order qualified them to hold a canonry. But this last clause is not in the other copy.

5. That the priest who is lewd with a woman is not a lawful priest; let him not celebrate mass or be heard by others, if he do.

6. That none be ordained subdeacon, or to any degree above that, without professing chastity.

d

7. That sons of priests be not heirs to their fathers' churches.

d Eadmer, the writer of Anselm's life, tells us that it was forbid by the Church of Rome for the son of a clergyman to be admitted into ecclesiastical offices, but that Pope Pascal dispensed with this in England by a decretal sent to Anselm. I find nothing of this elsewhere, but the reason given by Eadmer for this dispensation is very observable, viz., that "the greater and better part of the clergy in England were the sons of priests +."

8. That no clergymen be reeves or agents to secular persons, nor judges in case of blood.

9. That priests go not to drinking bouts, nor drink to pegs.

10. That priests' clothes be all of one colour, and their shoes plain.

11. That monks or clergymen who have forsaken their order do either return or be excommunicate.

12. That the crown of clergymen be visible.

[Ut presbyter quamdiu illicitam conversationem mulieris habuerit, non sit legalis, S. W.]

[Eadmer, ad calc. Anselmi, Op.

(Par. 1721) p. 76.]