nice difference betwixt JESUATS and JESUITS so near in name, though not in time; but, it seems, in nature distinguished. The former began at Sienna in Italy, in the year 1366; of whom thus Sabellicus colligebantur ab initio domesticatim simplici habitu amicti, multâ innocentiâ et pietate viri, victum sibi labore et operâ quæritantes. APOSTOLICI ab initio CLERICI nuncupati. Hi neque sacris initiantur, neque celebrant missarum solemnia, tantùm orationi vacant, Jesuati ab eo dicti, quòd Jesu regis summi frequens sit nomen in illorum ore, &c. "Men of much innocence and piety were gathered in the beginning from house to house, clothed in poor habit, and seeking their own livelihood with labour and pains, called from the beginning 'apostolical clerks.' These neither were entered into Orders, neither did celebrate the solemnity of masses, but only bestowed themselves in prayer, therefore called JESUATS, because the name of Jesus was so frequent in their mouths." But it seems these Jesuats sunk down in silence, when the Jesuits appeared in the world; the former counting it ill manners in likeness of name to sit so near to those who were so far their betters.

46-48. Jesuits the best Buttresses of the Romish Church. Jesuits' Policy. In England like Astrologers in Rome. - All Orders may be said eminently extant in the Jesuits, to and above the kind,—the degree thereof; and, indeed, they came seasonably to support the tottering church of Rome. For when the protestants, advantaged with learning and languages, brought in the Reformation, monks and friars were either so ignorant as they could not-so idle as they would not-or so cowardly that they durst not -make effectual opposition, as little skilled in Fathers, less in Scripture, and not at all versed in learned languages. As for the Franciscans, I may say of them, they were the best and worst scholars of all friars :* THE BEST, as most sublime in School-divinity: WORST, for if before their entrance into that Order they knew not learning, they were enjoined not to study it. Besides, monks and friars were so clogged with the observances of their Orders, that it confined them to their cells, and rendered them useless in a practical way. Wherefore, to balance the protestants, the Jesuits were set on foot, obliged to these studies, (out of fashion with monks and friars,) wherein they quickly attained a great eminency, as their very adversaries must confess. And, as their heads were better furnished than other Orders, so their hands were left at more liberty, (not tied behind their backs in a large posture of canonical idleness,) whence they are become the most active and pragmatical undertakers in all Christendom.

• See "Church History," vol. i. page 453.

I cannot but commend one policy in the Jesuits, which conduceth much to their credit; Lamely, whereas other Orders of monks and friars were after their first institution sifted (as I may say) through many other searches, still taking new names according to their sub-de-re-reformations; the Jesuits since their first foundation have admitted of no new denomination, but continue constant to their primitive constitution; chiefly, because sensible that such afterrefinings fix an aspersion of (at leastwise a comparative) impurity on their first institution, and render their first founders cheaper in the world's valuation whilst the Jesuits still keep themselves to their foundation, as begun and perfected at once, and are oλóxλnpoi, “ all of a lump, all of a piece," which unity amongst themselves maketh them the more considerable in their impressions on any other adversaries.

They had two most ancient and flourishing convents beyond the seas; Nola in Italy, as I take it, where their house it seems gives a bow for their arms; and La Flêche in France, where they have an arrow for their device; whereupon, a satirical witth us girded at them: and I hope I shall not be condemned as accessary to his virulency, if only plainly translating the same :—

Arcun Nola dedit, dedit his La-Fletcha Sagittam :
Illis, quis nervum, quem merúere, dabit?
"Nola to them did give a bow,

La Flêche an arrow bring:
But who upon them will bestow-

What they deserve-a string?"

、,),,,,

I have done with these Jesuits, who may well be compared unto the astrologers in Rome; of whom the historian doth complain Genus est hominum quod in civitate nostrâ et retabitur semper et retinebitur," There is a kind of men in our city who will always be forbidden, and yet always be retained therein." So, though many severe laws have been made against them, yet either such their boldness in adventuring, or our state-mildness in executing the statutes against them, that always they are driven hence, and always they stay here, to the great disturbance of ours, and advancement of their own religion.

Here I purposely omit the houses for leprous people, though indeed they deserved more charity than all the rest; and I may say, this only was an Order of God's making, when he was pleased to lay his afflicting hand on poor people in that loathsome disease. I take Burton-Lazars in Leicestershire to be the best-endowed house for that purpose. But as that disease came into England by the Holy

* TACIT. Hist. lib, i.

*

War, so, as we have elsewhere observed, it ended with the end thereof. And God of his goodness hath taken away the leprosy of leprosy in England,

SECTION II.

TO THE RIGHT WORSHIPFUL

RALPH SADLEIR, OF STANDON, ESQ. AND ANNE,
HIS VIRTUOUS CONSORT.

It was enacted by a law made in the twenty-seventh year of the reign of king Henry VIII. that " whosoever retained abbey-lands, after the dissolution passed unto them from the crown, should keep a standing-house, or else forfeit every month twenty nobles, recoverable from them in any court of record."

True it is, king James was graciously pleased (in the twenty-first of his reign) to repeal this Act and burn this rod; for which many under the lash, who will not pay, still owe thanks to his memory. But suppose this penal statute still in force, you may defy all informers for any advantage they may get against you for the

same.

Indeed, you are possessed of the fair convent of Westbury in Gloucestershire, and that on as honourable terms as any lands in England of that nature are enjoyed; bestowed on your grandfather Sir Ralph Sadleir by king Henry VIII. partly in reward of the good service he had done to him the father, partly in encouragement to what he might do to his three children, to all which he was privy counsellor.

Yet no danger of penalty to you, whose house is known to be the centre of hospitality; whence even abbots themselves, and they best skilled in that lesson, might learn to keep a bountiful table, where all are welcomed; the rich for courtesy, when their occasions bring them; the poor for charity, when they bring their occasions to pass by your habitation.

In my "Holy War."

Indeed, the inn-holders of London give for the motto of the arms of their company, "I was a stranger, and ye took me in." But, seeing our Saviour chiefly intended such who did not sell, but give, entertainment to strangers; more properly are the words applicable to yourself, and other self, whose house is so the inngeneral to all poor people, that the neighbourhood of a great and good common is not so advantageous as their vicinity thereunto.

you both

I doubt not but as you often have relieved Christ in his poor members, he will in due time receive into his house, wherein there be many mansions of everlasting happiness.

I. ABBEYS ENGROSSED TRADE, IMPOVERISHED PARISH-PRIESTS, ENCOURAGED OFFENDERS.

1. Abbots, Farmers, Tanners, Brewers.

THE specious pretences of piety and contempt of the world, abbots and monks, were notoriously covetous, even to the injury of others witness their renting and stocking of farms, keeping of tanhouses and brewhouses in their own hands. For, though the monks themselves were too fine-nosed to dabble in tan-fats, yet they kept others (bred in that trade) to follow their work. These convents, having bark of their own woods, hides of the cattle of their own breeding and killing, and (which was the main) a large stock of money to buy at the best hand, and to allow such chapmen they sold to, a long day of payment, easily ate out such who were bred up in that vocation. Whereupon, in the one-and-twentieth of king Henry VIII. a statute was made, that "no priest, either regular or secular, should on heavy penalties hereafter meddle with such mechanic employments."

2, 3. Abbots rob Parish Vicars, by Appropriations; and other Priests from Exemption from Tithes.

Secondly. They impoverished parish-priests, by decrying their performances, and magnifying their own merits. Alas! what was the single devotion of a silly priest, in comparison of a corporation of prayers (twisted cables to draw down blessings on their patrons' heads) from a whole monastery? And, suppose (which was seldom done) the parson in the parish preaching to his people; yet sermons

• Query" Pretenders to ?"-EDIT.

in a church once constituted were needless, as ministering matter of schisms and disputes, and, at the best, only profiting the presents whilst prayers benefited as well the absent as the present, dead as living. But especially prayers of monasteries commanded heaven, pleased with the holy violence of so many and mighty petitioners. By these and other artifices they undermined all priests in the affections of their own people, and procured from pope and prince, that many churches presentative, with their glebes and tithes, were appropriated to their convents, leaving but a poor pittance to the parishvicar; though the pope (as styling himself but a vicar) ought to have been more sensible of their sad condition.

Besides appropriation of such churches, abbeys also wronged parish-priests, by procuring from the pope Paschal II. A. D. 1100, in the council of Mentz, that their demesnes, farms, and granges, (anciently paying tithes like the lands of other laymen,) should hereafter be free from the same. But this exemption was afterwards, by pope Adrian IV. about the year 1150, justly limited and restrained; religious Orders being enjoined the payment of tithes of whatsoever increase they had in their own occupation, save of new improvements by culture of pasture of their cattle, and of gardenfruits.* Only three Orders, namely, the Cistercians, Templars, and Knights-Hospitallers, (otherwise called "of St. John's of Jerusalem,") were exempted from the general payment of all tithes whatsoever.

4-6. Freedom from Tithes goeth by Favour; confined to Lands given before the Lateran Council. Offend none in a captious Age.

"And why Cistercians, rather than any other Order?" Give me leave to conjecture three reasons thereof:-1. Adrian IV. our none countryman, was at first a Benedictine monk of St. Alban's and these Cistercians were only Benedictines refined. 2. They were the Benjamins, one of the youngest remarkable Orders of that age, and therefore made darlings (not to say wantons) by the holy father the pope. 3. It is suspicious, that, by bribery in the court of Rome, they might obtain this privilege, so beneficial unto them. For I find, that king Richard I. disposed his daughter Avarice to be married to the Cistercian Order, as the most grasping and griping of all others. I leave it others to render reasons why Templars and Hospitallers, being mere laymen, and divers times of late adjudged in the Court of Aids in Paris "no part of the clergy, should have this privilege to be exempted from tithes."+ But we remember they were sword men, and that aweth all into obedience.

Vide ALEX. IV. in 6, de dec. c. 2, Statuto et Innoc. VIII. tom. ii. page 4, Editio decima Coloniens." LE BRET Advoc. ex la dicte cour. Playdoie 27.