CHAPTER XIV

RELATIONS WITH CHURCH AND STATE “_As to other hospitals, which he of another foundation and patronage than of the King, the Ordinaries shall enquire of the manner of the foundation, estate and governance of the same . . . and make thereof correction and reformation according to the laws of Holy Church, as to them belongeth._” (Parliament of Leicester.) Attention having been already called to the internal constitution of hospitals, we must now consider their relation to those in authority. The position of such a house was necessarily complicated; there arose a difficulty in reconciling its subordinate, yet partly independent character. We must see, first, how its welfare depended to a certain extent on king and bishop; secondly, its position with regard to the parochial system; and thirdly, how far it was affected by monasticism. (i) RELATIONS WITH THE KING AND THE BISHOP The hospitals of England have never been exclusively in the hands of Church or State. The relations which they bore to each may be subdivided under the headings of Constitution, Jurisdiction and Finance. (a) _Constitution._—As we have seen, the Church, usually represented by the diocesan bishop, was responsible for the rule and statutes by which a hospital was guided. (b) _Jurisdiction._—In the province of administration, visitation and reform, king and bishop played their [p195] respective parts. Speaking generally, the bishop was administrator, and the king protector; to the former, matters of religious observance and conduct were referred, to the latter, questions of temporal privilege, immunity from taxation, etc. Both had rights as “visitors.” Faithfully conducted, ecclesiastical visitation might be of great use, but owing to the huge extent of dioceses, it was infrequent and inadequate, and where the king was patron, the diocesan bishop’s visitation was prohibited. Under Henry III, the royal almoner undertook the keeping of Crown hospitals, but afterwards this duty fell to the Chancellor, who alone had the right of visitation; the diocesan bishop had no jurisdiction in such houses except by special arrangement, as in the Statute directing that ordinaries “by virtue of the king’s commission to them directed” shall take inquisitions and return them into chancery. Royal interposition was not customary unless the king were patron; thus an order to inquire into waste at certain hospitals was cancelled because the king had erred in believing that they were founded by his progenitors. When investigations were commanded, they were committed to a local jury, who were to find by inquisition on oath of the good men of the county how far rules had been observed, and they possessed full power “to deal with the hospital as well in the head as in the members.” Detailed accounts of such special visitations may be found among _Chancery Miscellanea_ in the Record Office. (c) _Finance._—The Lateran Council of 1179 decreed that leper-communities should not pay tithe from gardens and orchards, nor of the increase of cattle, and this was ratified in the Provincial Council of Westminster in 1200. The [p196] Church wished to go a step further and ordain that neither lazar-house, Domus Dei nor poor hospital should pay taxes, which was set forth by Gregory X; entries upon Papal Registers in 1278 declare that certain English houses, including Ospringe, should share this immunity. But the decree was not necessarily accepted in England, remission of taxation being a royal prerogative; Ospringe was a Crown hospital to which exemption was renewed from time to time of the king’s grace. In the cases of lazar-houses, a curious distinction was made, witnessing incidentally to national independence—“And let not the goods of lepers be taxed where they are governed by a leper” (_par Sovereyn meseal_). This rule occurs in the First Statute of Westminster (3 Edw. I),[118] and afterwards in rolls and writs dated 1297, 1307, etc.[119] It was evidently in allusion to this custom that, in remitting a wool-tax, it is stated that St. Bartholomew’s, Rochester, was governed by a leprous prior (1342), but a few years later the king granted it freedom from taxation for ever. Many houses were freed by charter from local and general contributions and tolls. Land-tenure may be included under finance. Before the enactment of the Statute _De Religiosis_, benefactors met with no hindrance in promoting any plan for endowment, but after 1279 permission was sought “to alienate land in mortmain.” On payment of a small fine, communities were empowered to accept property to a certain value. This developed into the “licence to found” named in fourteenth-century rolls, and subsequently into incorporation. [p197] (ii) RELATIONS WITH THE PARISH PRIEST Before the foundation of a hospital chapel, special permission was required from the bishop, with a guarantee that it should not interfere with the parochial system. It was necessary clearly to define privileges, lest friction should arise. Grants in civil and ecclesiastical registers include “a chapel, bell and chaplain,” oblations, sepulture and “the cure of souls.” (a) _Oblations._—One quarter of the offerings received at St. Katharine’s, Ledbury, was reserved for parochial use. Unless some definite scheme was arranged, disputes quickly arose. A serious collision of interests occurred at Brough. The tiny hostel, founded with the sanction of bishop and archbishop (1506), developed into a pilgrimage-place. The injured vicar, with solemn ritual, cursed with bell, book and candle all concerned with such oblations as were made in the chapel. The founder, however, called forth upon his parson the archbishop’s censure “as an abandoned wretch and inflated with diabolical venom for opposing so good a work.” The priest in turn appealed to the Pope. At length it was agreed that 20s. yearly should be paid to the mother-church.[120] (b) _Public and private Worship, Bells, etc._—Agreements as to public worship on certain occasions were made between the parish and institutions within its boundary. The biographer of the Berkeley family, quoting from the episcopal register (1255), records:— “That all the seculars in the hospitall of Longbridge, exceptinge a Cooke, and one person to kepe sick folkes, should in the spetiall solemne dayes, come to Berkeley Church and there [p198] should receive all the ecclesiasticall Sacraments, (except holy bread and holy water) unles it bee by the dispensation and leave of the Vicar of Berkeley.”[121] To infringe such rules meant trouble. One Easter (1439), the chaplain of St. Leonard’s, Leicester, permitted two of the warden’s servants to receive the Sacrament from him there, instead of repairing to the parish church; but the following Sunday he was forced to do public penance. The curious restriction of repeating divine service with closed doors and in an undertone was made at St. John’s, Nottingham, when the patronal feasts were being celebrated in the parish. The rule for ordinary days was that of St. James’ near Canterbury (1414), namely, that the canonical hours be said audibly after the sounding of the handbells or bells according to ancient custom. [Illustration: 29. GLASTONBURY] The possession of a bell in a turret required a special licence, lest outside worshippers should attend. A chapel being added to St. Mary Magdalene’s, Bristol (1226), the stipulation was made [p199] “but the leprous women shall have no bells except handbells, and these shall not be hung up.” It was agreed at Portsmouth (1229) that the two bells in God’s House should not exceed the weight of those of the parish church, and should only ring at set hours. The _Annals of Dunstable Monastery_ show how important the matter was considered:— “In the same year (1293) the lepers of Dunstaple set up a mighty bell outside the precincts of their house on two timbers; but the prior . . . brought that bell within our jurisdiction; which afterwards he restored to them yet so that they should by no means use that or any other bell for calling together our parishioners or other people.” (c) _Burial Rights._—The privilege of sepulture rendered the community more independent, and secured to it certain fees and legacies. A popular institution like St. Leonard’s, York, or St. John’s, Exeter, derived benefits from the burial of benefactors. There is a will entered on the Patent Roll of 1341 whereby a certain Vincent de Barnastapolia requested to be interred in the cemetery of St. Mark’s, Bristol, to which house he left a considerable legacy.[122] The conferring or denial of a place of sepulture seems to have been without rule, and was a matter of favour and circumstance. Thus St. Oswald’s, Worcester, had a cemetery (probably because it was originally a leper-house), whilst St. Wulstan’s had none. (d) _Worship and Burial of Lepers._—To lepers both chapel and graveyard were willingly granted. This was an early custom in England, as the Norman architecture of several chapels shows (e.g. Rochester, _circa_ 1100). The [p200] Gloucester lazars were granted burial rights before 1160, when they already possessed a chapel, the chancel of which still stands; the bishop’s licence made the usual stipulation that none but lepers should be interred.[123] A fresh impetus was given to spiritual provision for outcasts by the Lateran Council of 1179. Pope Alexander III decreed as follows:— “Seeing that it is very remote from Christian piety that those who seek their own and not the things of Jesus Christ do not permit lepers . . . to have churches or burial places of their own, nor to be assisted by the ministry of a priest of their own, we ordain that these lepers be permitted to have the same without any contradiction.” This privilege, it was declared, must not be prejudicial to the rights of ancient churches. * * * * * Digressing from the immediate subject of spiritual provision for the outcast, one point must be made clear. It is sometimes thought that the strict parochial discipline of mediæval England would insist upon the attendance of the leper at his parish church on certain occasions; others on the contrary suppose that the leper was excommunicate. The popular belief is that the Church provided for his worship the so-called “leper’s window,” frequently shown in old edifices. The existence of low-side-windows at such places as Bridgnorth and Spondon, where there were leper-colonies, is considered circumstantial evidence of their origin and purpose. But name and idea alike are of entirely modern growth, arising from a misinterpretation of a wall-painting at Windsor, which Mr. Street took to represent the [p201] communicating of a leper through an aperture. Administration would have been both difficult and irreverent; the opening, moreover, is often so situated that any such act would be physically impossible. A manuscript chronicle, indeed, records how Blase Tupton, who was dwelling near St. Chad’s, Shrewsbury, about the year 1409, had a gallery made so that she might join in public worship:— “Blase . . . cam by chance to be a leeper, and made the oryell which goythe allong the west side of the churche-yarde, throughe which she cam aloft to heare serveys throughe a doore made in the churche wale, and so passyd usually uppon the leades unto a glasse wyndowe, throughe which she dayly sawe and hard dayly serveys as longe as shee lyvyd.”[124] Now Blase was doubtless a privileged person, being the daughter of the well-known townsman who had founded the almshouse adjoining St. Chad’s; and though now and again a lazar might make his way to a churchyard to gaze upon the holy mysteries, it is certain that only those living in a community with a chapel and priest could be confessed and receive the Blessed Sacrament. Most antiquaries are of opinion that the popular theory of the object of lowside-windows is untenable. * * * * * Careful provision was made for the religious observances of the untainted inmates of a hospital as well as for the leprous. They might use the chapel except on the greater festivals when they were required to attend the parish church and make oblations there. At St. Mary Magdalene’s, Bristol, the infected confessed to their chaplain, but the rest to the parish priest. No parishioner of Bedminster might attend the chapel on Sundays or [p202] festivals to receive the blessed bread and holy water, the distribution of which to other than inmates would infringe parochial rights.[125] It was provided by the founder’s statutes at Sherburn that on Sundays the lepers should receive “the sprinkling of holy water, blessed bread, and other things which are fitting.” (e) _Free Chapels._—These were “places of worship exempted from all relation to the mother church and also from episcopal jurisdiction, an exemption which was an equivocal privilege, obtained immediately from the Crown, or appended to ancient manors originally belonging to the Crown.”[126] St. John’s, Oxford, was a privileged proprietary chapel. The king withheld the right of visitation from the bishop of the diocese, who, in turn, seems to have refused to sanction and consecrate a graveyard. Henry III called in the Roman Pontiff to arbitrate; whereupon “the pope at the instance of the king commanded the Bishop of Lincoln to provide a burial ground for the hospital of Oxford, for the brethren of the hospital and for the poor dying therein, the indemnity of the mother church and of the king as patron being provided for.”[127] The kings contrived to evade the Bishop of Lincoln’s rightful authority. Edward I wrote to request Bishop Giffard of Worcester to confer holy orders upon a brother “because the same hospital is the king’s free chapel where the diocesan ought to exercise no jurisdiction.” The Close Roll of 1304 emphasizes the fact that the house was wholly independent and therefore “quit of payments, procurations and other exactions of the ordinary.”[128] [p203] A few royal hospitals were subordinate to the Crown and the papal see. That of Basingstoke, with its “free chapel of the king”, was granted immunity from episcopal control by Cardinal Ottobon (1268). The Maison Dieu, Dover, was taken under immediate papal protection by a bull of Nicholas III (1277). A unique case occurs where the lay founder of an almshouse at Nottingham gained for it freedom from the jurisdiction of the ordinary or judges, and subjection alone “to St. Peter and the Apostolic See” (1402).[129] (f) “_The Cure of Souls._”—Whereas the “free chapel” had no parochial obligations, there were hospital churches to which full parochial rights were attached. How or why such houses as St. Paul’s, Norwich, and Armiston came to possess “the cure of souls” is uncertain; the little chapel of St. Mary Magdalene, Durham (now a ruin), was also a rectorial parish church. More curious is the fact that several _leper-hospitals_ acquired this peculiar advantage. Thus in Northampton, although St. John’s was “no parish church, but only for the company there inhabiting,” St. Leonard’s was a “liberty” having parochial rights, not only of burial, but of Baptism. St. Nicholas’, York, required as master, “a fit clerk who shall be able to answer for the cure of souls belonging to the parish church of that hospital.” The Lincoln leper-house had similar rights. (g) _Almshouses and the Parish Church._—Many of the later almshouses were closely connected with the parish. At Ewelme, for example, the almsmen resorted to the church constantly, and their presence was regarded as so important that even absence on pilgrimage was [p204] deprecated. Those institutions which had no chaplain of their own were brought into close touch with the parish priest, as at Croydon, where the poor men went every day to the church to “here all manner divine service there to be songe and saide.” (h) _Collegiate Foundations._—Several large almshouses possessed collegiate rights or formed part of a college (e.g. St. Mary’s, Leicester; Shrewsbury, Tong, Heringby). Sometimes, as at Higham Ferrers, there existed side by side a parish church, a bede-house for pensioners, and a college for the priests and clerks. (iii) RELATIONS WITH MONK, KNIGHT AND FRIAR Inquiry must now be made concerning the relation between hospitals and monastic life. Although the religious orders directly influenced certain houses, others were totally unconnected with them. Canon Raine says that St. Leonard’s, York, was more of a secular than an ecclesiastical establishment; he regards it as principally a lay institution, although religion was, of course, a strong element in its working. In this hospital “which is of no order” (says a Papal Letter, 1429) the master might be a layman. [Illustration: _PLATE XXIII._ ST. JOHNS HOSPITAL, WILTON (_a_) SOUTH-EAST VIEW. (_b_) NORTH VIEW]