Note B.

On Cathedral or Collegiate Institutions, as means for the planting the Gospel, and its subsequent maintenance of the Gospel by a native Clergy.

The tradition which connects the first conversion of this island with the coming of Joseph of Arimathæa and his twelve companions, and their settling at Glastonbury, (whatever be its character,) at least bears witness to an ancient belief that institutions of bodies of Clergy were instrumental in the first establishment of Christianity among us; and the possession of the twelve hides of land by the Abbey of Glastonbury, (which is a known fact, much dwelt and insisted upon in the later tradition,) taken in connection with the frequent adoption of that number in missionary efforts, (in memory of the Apostles,) furnishes a strong presumption, that such was the original number of the body so employed. The following instances are furnished by a friend, to whom the writer has often been indebted. The tradition, (whatever be the value of its details) of " Fingarus, Guigner or Gwinear, with his sister Piala, eleven Bishops, and a numerous attendance, all baptized [and some even consecrated] by St. Patrick," who "came into Cornwall, and, landing at the mouth of the river Hayle, was there put to death, in the year 460, with all his company, by Theodorick, K. of Cornwall, lest they should turn his subjects from their ancient religion'." The Gospel was carried into Bavaria by Rupert, made Bishop of Saltzburg, and twelve assistants. "Willibrod went with eleven into Holland." In the restoration of Christianity by the later Augustine, there were to be

Borlase, ap. Whitaker, Ancient Cathedral of Cornwall historically surveyed, i. 327.

Milner, Church Hist. iii. 114.

twelve Bishops under the Archbishop of London, and as many under York, two Apostolic Colleges, as it were"; of whom the southern twelve were actually settled under Canterbury. To the same purpose is the account in Giraldus of the division of Britain into five provinces, each with twelve suffragans ;-the twelve settled at Lantwet in Glamorganshire; Columba, the Converter of the North Picts, and his twelve disciples. Our Cathedrals or Collegiate Churches, where there are twelve prebendaries or where the body consists of twelve persons, (the head being sometimes included, sometimes not,) are a remnant of the same; (Bangor, Canterbury, Durham, Custos and Vicars Choral of Hereford, Lichfield, Llandaff, Minor Canons of St. Paul's, Winchester, Westminster, Windsor.) In other cases, the number has been doubled, as in Exeter, where are twentyfour. So at Lincoln, Remigius de Fescamp, its first Bishop, "took care to lay the foundations of a most magnificent Church... and, according to the Norman custom, appointed to the government thereof a Dean, Precentor, Chancellor, Treasurer, and one and twenty Prebendaries [making up thus four and twenty beside the Dean], and placed seven Archdeacons over the Diocese." The number of the stalls, when the establishment was complete, we are told "was undoubtedly seventy, according to the second order of disciples:" in like manner as the number

Bede, i. 29. ap. Usser. de Brit. Eccl. Prim. p. 92. *Johnson's Canons, 803, 1. and 816.

y Usser, p. 92, 3.

z Ib. 472.

a Ib. 694. Bp. Lloyd, Church Government of England and Ireland,

c. 5.

b So "" a Charter of William the Conqueror grants to God and St. Paul and his servants the twenty-four hides of land, which Ethelbert gave to the Church of St. Paul when he founded it." Stillingfleet, Eccl. Cases, t. ii. p. 559.

c Willis, History of Cathedrals, i. p. 46.

d Ibid. p. 4.

twelve was a memorial of the first order, and seven of the third in the Apostolic Church.

It was, again, by means of these establishments, that, after Christianity had been driven into the West by the Saxons, and they "left not the face of Christianity wherever they did prevail," it was restored, and our forefathers became Christians. The sacred flame was kindled at each extremity of our island, and at each in the same way, in Northumbria by Aidan, in Kent by Augustine, alike Monks and Bishops. And the See and Abbey of Lindisfarne, formed upon the model of that of Iona, whence Aidan came, was the source whence the Gospel was diffused from the North', as the Cathedral Churches of Christ in Canterbury and St. Paul in London were in the South

A passage of Bp. Stillingfleet, on occasion of this last, gives so full an account of the principles upon which they proceeded, that, though frequently quoted of late, more or less fully, it is well again to insert it". ul MA

"After that, by the influence of his Queen Bertha, and the persuasions of Augustine the Monk, Ethelbert had embraced the Christian faith, the first thing he took care of, was to have Churches erected for the public worship of God.-At London, by the encouragement of Sebert and Ethelbert, two Churches were designed by Mellitus, the one within the city to the memory of St. Paul, the other at a distance from it, in an island then called Thorney, [now Westminster,] to St. Peter's. Both these were called Minsters, i. e. Monasteries; for, from St. Augustine's time, the Clergy living together with their

Engl. Hist. ap. Stillingfleet Orig. c. 5. p. 356. f See e. g. Lloyd, Church Gov. c. 5, 6. !

As in the author's Past and Prospective Benefits of Cathedral Establishments, p. 133. ed. 2. The Prebendary, part i. [by an Archdeacon.] h Disc. of the true Antiq. of London, Stillingfleet's Eccl. Cases, vol. ii. pp. 549, 552-559.

Bishop do bear the name of a Monastery. But these were of two different kinds; that which stood in a place of retirement, as Westminster then did, was intended for a nursery to the Church, wherein persons might be bred up in a way of devotion and learning, to fit them for further service, when they should be taken out; but the other was made up of such who were actually employed in the daily offices; or sent up and down by the Bishop to such places as he thought fit, for instructing the people. This seemed to have been Gregory's design, when he sent Mellitus and the rest over, that wherever they settled a Church, they should take care of both those foundations. So Gotselin, in his Life of Augustin', saith, that Ethelbert, after his conversion, took care to establish two things, Episcopia and Monasteria; what he presently after calls Ecclesiæ and Coenobia, i. e. Cathedral Churches and Nurseries of Religion and Learning, to fit men for the service of the Church. And that the first Monasteries here were so designed, appears by the education of persons therein for the service 'of the Church. For, although at first they were forced to make use of foreigners, yet, after a reasonable time, the English were bred up so as to be capable of the highest dignities in the Church. For, immediately after the death of Gregory's own disciples, viz. Augustin, Laurentius, Mellitus, Justus, and Honorius, who were successively Archbishops of Canterbury, the next who succeeded was an Englishman, born among the West Saxons, who was called by a Latin name Deusdedit'; and after him, by the consent of the kings of Northumberland and Kent, Wighardus, another Englishman, was chosen in his place, one highly commended by Bede for his learning"; and so at Rochester, Ithamar, a Kentishman, succeeded Paulinus, 1 Bede, l. iii.

i

c. 23.

c. 20.

k W. Thorn. Chron. c. 1. §. 6. m 1. iv. c. 1.

G

and comparable, saith Bede, to his predecessors, either for life or doctrine". He was the first Englishman advanced in the Church, saith Malmesbury, and brought a reputation to the nation by his excellent learning; to whom Damianus succeeded, who was a South Saxon". These I instance, to shew that, before the coming of Theodore, care was taken to breed up persons in learning, for the service of the Church and Bede takes great care to shew how well the Monasteries were furnished to that purpose; and how he was brought up himself so, under Ceolfrid, from seven years old. He tells how many journeys to Rome Benedict Biscop took to provide the best books for their Library; and he speaks of the division of his time between praying, studying, writing, and instructing others. And where Bede speaks of Sigebert's appointing a School among the East Angles for the education of youth, he saith that Felix, Bishop of the Diocese, provided Masters and Tutors for them, according to the custom at Canterbury'. Now this Sigebert was contemporary with Eadbaldus, son to Ethelbert; and Felix was Bishop of the East Angles while Honorius was Archbishop, and Paulinus Bishop of Rochester. From whence it follows, that at Canterbury there was care taken, in the Monastery there founded, for Masters and Tutors; in order to the education of fit persons for the Church's service."

"The like care, we have reason to believe, was taken in other Dioceses as well as that of Canterbury and the East Angles; especially where we have such evidence of the building a Cathedral Church and a Monastery, as there was by Mellitus in the Diocese of London. Bede, indeed saith no more than that Ethelbert caused the Church of St. Paul's to be built in London for an Epis

n l. iii. c. 14. • De gestis Pontif. 1. i. 9 Hist. Albat. Wiremuth. p. 26.

P Bede, l. iii. c. 20. Bede, Hist. iii, 18.