Internal
divisions of
the clerical
body.
Political
partisanship
among the
clergy.
382 Consfitutional History. [chap.
universal application that a body so widely spread, and so
variously composed, could be brought to act together. Against
any direct interference from the temporal power, unauthorised
taxation or restrictive legislation, the clergy might act as a
body ; but within the sphere of ecclesiastical politics, and within
the sphere of temporal politics, they were as much liable to
division as were the baronage or the commons. The seculars
hated the regulars ; the monks detested the friars ; the Domini-
cans and Franciscans regarded one another as heretics ; the
Cistercians and the Cluniacs were jealous rivals : matters of
ritual, of doctrine, of church policy—the claims of poverty and
chastity, the rights and wrongs of endowments—the merits of
rival popes, or of pope and council—licenced and unlicenced
preaching, licenced and unlicenced confession and direction—
were fought out under the several standards of order and pro-
fession. And not less in the politics of the kingdom. As in
early days the regulars sustained Becket and the seculars sup-
ported Henry II, under John the clergy were divided between
the king and the bishops ; the Franciscans of the thirteenth
century were allied with Grosseteste and Simon de Montfort ;
under Edward III they followed Ockham and Marsilius, and
linked Grosseteste with WycIiffe ; under Henry IV they fur-
nished martyrs in the cause of restoration. In the great social
rising of 1381 clergy as well as laymen were implicated ; secular
priests as well as friars died for Richard II ; and later on the
whole body of the clergy was arrayed for or against one of the
rival houses. It was well that it was so, and that the welfare
of the whole English church was not staked on the victory of
a faction or a policy, even though the faction may have been
legally or the policy morally the best. The clergy could no
longer, as one united estate, mediate with authority between
parties, but they might, and probably did, help on reconcilia-
tion where reconciliation was possible, and somewhat humanise
the struggle when the struggle must be fought out.
406. The existence of a clerical element in every class of
society, and in so large proportion, must in some respects have
been a great social benefit. Every one admitted even to minor
XiX.] Social position of the Clergy. 383
orders must have been able to read and write ; and for the Diffusion of
sub-deaconate and higher grades a knowledge of the New education7
Testament, or, at the very least, of the Gospels and Epistles from the
in the Missal, was requisite1. This was tested by careful dericairead
examination in grammar and ritual, at every step ; even a body'
bishop elect might be rejected by the archbishop for literary
deficiency2 ; and the bishop who wittingly ordained an ignorant
person was deemed guilty of deadly sin. The great obscurity
which hangs over the early history of the universities makes
it impossible to guess how large a portion of the clergy had
received their education there ; but towards the close of the Colleges
. π ,1 .. ., and schools.
period the foundation of colleges connected with particular
counties and monasteries must have carried some elements of
higher education into the remotest districts; the monastic and
other schools placed some modicum of learning within reach
of all. The rapid diffusion of Lollard tracts is itself a proof
that many men could be found to read them ; in every manor Knowledge
was found some one who could write and keep accounts in common.
Latin ; and it was rather the scarcity and cost of books, than
the inability to read, that caused the prevalent ignorance of the
later middle ages. Some germs of intellectual culture were
spread everywhere, and, although perhaps it would still be as
easy to find a clerk who could not write as a layman who could,
it is a mistake to regard even so dark a period as the fifteenth
century as an age of dense ignorance. In all classes above the
1 The rules on the subject of examination were very strict; see Maskell,
Mon. Rιt. iii. xcv. sq.
2 Thus in 1229 Walter, elect of Canterbury, was rejected by the pope
for failing in his examination; M. Paris, iii. x?o. There are some
instances in which this was oveyruled. Lewis Beaumont of Durham
could scarcely read the hard words in his profession of obedience ; sec
vol. ii. p. 332 ; Robert Stretton elect of Coventry was rejected by arch-
bishop Islip but forced by the king and the pope into his see ; he could
not read his profession, and it was read for him ; Islip in disgust declined
to take part in the consecration ; Ang. Sac. i. 44, 449. Robert Orford
elect of Ely was rejected by Winchelsey ‘ob minus Sufficientem Iitera-
turam ;, on application to the pope he convinced him that he had not
failed in his examination but had answered logically not theologically ;
ib. p. 64τ. Giraldus Cambrensis has some amusing stories about the bad
Latin of the bishops of his time ; but on the whole the cases of proved
incompetence are very few.