Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB
[ocr errors]

ster on the 28th of April, 1540. On the 13th of May a bill was brought into the House of Peers for granting to the King, and his heirs and successors, all the houses, lands, and goods of all the Abbeys, Priories, Nunneries, Chantries, Hospitals, and Religious Houses, that had already been surrendered or suppressed, or that should thereafter be so.

The Journals take no notice of any opposition to this Bill in the House of Peers, -but it certainly met with opposition. There were no fewer than twenty Abbots in that house, who could not all be silent on that occasion. Besides, we are informed that CRANMER, Archbishop of Canterbury, LATIMER, Bishop of Worcester, and several other Prelates who favoured the new Learning, (as THE REFORMATION was then called,) pleaded earnestly for the preservation of three or four Houses in every County, to be converted into Schools for the education of Youth, and Hospitals for the relief of the Poor,-and that, by their opposition to his favourite Bill, they in

curred the King's displeasure, which he soon afterwards made them feel.

Great art was used to persuade the Temporal Peers and the Members of the House of Commons to pass this Bill, against which they had many objections. But, independent of the great military force which the Monastic revenues would maintain, they were assured, that no more Loans or Subsidies should ever be demanded.

The Bill accordingly passed both Houses of Parliament with much less opposition than might have been expected,—and, in consequence of it, all the Possessions of Six hundred and forty-five Convents, ninety Colleges, two thousand three hundred and seventy-four Chantries and Free Chapels, and an hundred and ten Hospitals, were annexed to the Crown.4

Thus it is evident, that the Poor of England, until the time of King HENRY the Eighth, subsisted entirely upon private

4

Henry's Hist. of Great Britain, vol. vi. p. 443. 4to. edit. 1793.

[ocr errors]

benevolence, and the charity of well disposed Christians. For, although it appears by "The Mirrour," that by the Common law the Poor were to be "sus"tained by Parsons, Rectors of the church, "and the Parishioners,-so that none of "them die for default of sustenance,' and although by the Statutes of the 12th of RICHARD the Second, and of the 19th of HENRY the Seventh, the Poor were directed to abide in the cities or towns wherein they were born, or such wherein they had dwelt for three years, (which seem to be the first rudiments of Parish settlements),-yet, until the Statute of the 27th of HENRY the Eighth, no compulsory method appears to be chalked out for this purpose, but the Poor seem to have been left to such relief, as the humanity of their neighbours would afford them.

The Monasteries were, in particular, their principal resource, and, among other bad effects which attended the Monastic institutions, it was not, perhaps, one

of the least (though frequently esteemed quite otherwise), that they supported and fed a very numerous and very idle poor, whose sustenance depended upon what was daily distributed in alms at the gates of the Religious Houses. But, upon the total dissolution of these, the inconvenience of thus encouraging the poor in habits of indolence and beggary was quickly felt throughout the Kingdom,-and abundance of Statutes were made in the reign of King HENRY the Eighth and his immediate Successors, for providing for the poor and impotent,-which, the preambles to some of them recite, had of late years greatly increased.5

The Dissolution of Monasteries, and the consequent abolition of Monastic Orders, happily, then, opened the way to the conversion of their accumulated possessions into Charities of the purest benevolence, and widely spread that sympathy of well disposed persons for the relief of

[ocr errors]

5 Blackstone's Commentaries, edited by Archbold, vol. i. p. 358.

the Poor, which exalts this Nation above all others in the scale of general Philanthropy.

It must not, however, be concluded, that Donations for Charitable purposes as we now see them, were confined solely to the period of THE REFORMATION, for we find numerous instances of large bequests scattered through the Reports of The Commissioners, anterior to that Event. The origin of Alms is of very early date, as the kindness of Man must always have induced him to compassionate the distress of his species, though the times immediately succeeding THE REFORMATION were peculiarly adapted to encourage those honourable feelings.

From this copious source of Commiseration have arisen those numerous Establishments of Charity, which the Piety and Benevolence of this Nation have erected as perpetual Monuments of their praise. There is scarcely a disease which can afflict Human Nature, or a want which the varying condition of man can experience, scarcely a course of life, for

« AnteriorContinuar »