Of these presumptuous absurdities, the red-hot iron ordeal appears to have been most in favour. It was, indeed, obviously the safest. The accused had scarcely to take the burning mass into his hand before he was allowed to throw it down. For this brief interval most men probably gave the skin some preparation. It was not, besides, expected that the hand would remain unburnt. Innocence was established if the priest, after three days, pronounced the injured part to be healthy. Thus a good constitution, or even a priest inclined to be merciful, could hardly fail of acquitting the bulk of men tried in this way. In some instances, there can be no reasonable doubt, a bribe secured mercy from the priest. Most cases he would be likely to consider as calling for no very rigorous scrutiny. The Roman church very properly refused encouragement to such modes of tempting providence, and to her hierarchy Europe was eventually indebted for their discontinuance'. "It does not appear that the prohibition of ordeal mentioned Church of Rome ever gave coun- by Sir H. S." (Spelman) "here in tenance to it; and it is a very England, is in a letter from King singular instance of a gross cor- Henry III. to his justices itinerant ruption that it had not the pope in the north, in the third year of or his creatures for its author. If his reign. Yet this learned knight it ever was directly authorized by observes, that eight years after any council in a foreign church, this he granted the religious of it was only by some new converts Sempringham power to administer in Germany in the ninth century. it. Great lawyers have said that The council of Mentz, 847, c. 24, it was suppressed by Act of Parenjoins the ordeal of ploughshares liament in the third year of his to suspected servants. But to give reign. But the record mentions the pope, I mean Stephen V., his only the king's letter, and the due, he presently condemned it in king's letter says it was done by an epistle to the bishop of Mentz, the advice of his council, and gives in whose diocese it chiefly pre- this only reason, that it was forvailed. Nay, Alexander II., the bidden by the Church of Rome." Conqueror's own ghostly father,—(JOHNSON, sub an. 1065. can. 2.) absolutely forbade it. The first Ordeals, however, cannot be accu Ordeals, being esteemed a branch of civil jurisprudence, were forbidden on days consecrated to religion. The same prohibition lay against judicial oaths'. Connected with such suspensions of ordinary business, was a regulation of the last importance in an age of violence and insecurity. The days that forbade an ordeal and a solemn oath, interdicted also angry passions from warlike outrage. The Church mercifully proclaimed a general truce, and her holy voice was wisely seconded by the civil power. Thus, ferocious overbearing violence was continually arrested in its pitiless career, and religion provided stated respites for the weak, which laws merely human could not safely promise. Happily the days were numerous on which the Church insisted upon peace. In every year whole seasons were thus kindly consecrated. The truce of religion extended from the beginning of Advent until the eighth day after the Epiphany; from Septuagesima until the octaves of Easter; from Ascension Day until the same time after Whit-Sunday; and through all the Ember weeks. Besides this the holy truce began on three o'clock on every Saturday afternoon, and lasted until Monday morning. The same happy privilege secured a joyful welcome for all the principal saints' days, and within particular districts, for the festivals of those saints to whom their churches were severally dedicated. The eve came, and ferocity was hushed. Protection, also, was at all times extended rately taken as extinguished under Henry III. For the trial by wager of battle is a mere ordeal, and the legal extinction of this is very recent. It was introduced under the Conqueror. A trace of the water ordeal lingered among the common people until the last cen tury, in their disposition to try barbarous experiments upon unhappy creatures accused of witchcraft. 1 LL. Edov. Sen. et Guth. RR. c. 9. SPELM. i. 393. WILK. i. 203. to persons in their way to or from a church, or a synod, or a chapter'. Disregard of these provisions was properly cognizable before the bishop. If his authority were neglected or defied, it was to be rendered available in the civil courts'. It was among the evils of religious usages introduced from Rome, that they tended to confirm the superstition of barbarian converts. A rude and ignorant populace could not fail of considering as powerful charms those substances which the Church invested with a venerable character. Nor were the clerical members of such a community often likely to disturb the prejudices of their contemporaries. It appears, accordingly, that water, oil, and other like ingredients, in Romish worship, were esteemed efficacious for eradicating bodily disease". There is, indeed, always this danger when material objects are connected with ordinary devotion. To the reflecting few these may be only interesting relics of a 1LL. Eccl. S. Edw. R. et Conf. c. 3. SPELM. i. 619. WILK. i. 311. 2 Ib. c. 7. (Hom. in Nat. S. Cuthb. Bibl. Bodl. MSS. BODLEY, 340, f. 65.) With holy water he healed a woman, the alderman's wife, from a 3 Mid halegum wætere he ge- miserable disease, and she, soon hælde sum wif, thæs ealdormannes sound, waited upon himself. Afterawe, fram earmlicere cothe, and wards at the same time, he with heo sona gesund him sylfum the- oil smeared a maiden lying in long node. Eft on thære ylcan tide affliction, through a grievous headhe mid ele smyrode an licgende ache, and she was soon better of mæden on langsumum sure, thurh it. A certain pious man was also hefig-timum heafod-ece, and hire very ill, and lay at the point of sona was bet. Sum eanfæst wer death given over by his friends. was eac yfele gehæfd, and læg at One of these had some holy bread forth-sithe his freondum orwene. which the pious man formerly Tha hafde heora sum haligne hlaf blessed, and he dipped it immethone the se eadiga wer ær geblet- diately in water, and moistened sode, and he thane thær-rihte on his kinsman's mouth with it, water bedypte, and his adligum and immediately assuaged the mage on thone muthe begeat, and disease. thær-rihte thære adle gestilde. distant age: among the thoughtless many they will certainly find aliment for a grovelling superstition. No feature was, however, more exceptionable in Anglo-Saxon theology than the penitential system. It might seem a very desirable check upon human corruption, especially among a gross and barbarous people, that every offence should rigorously exact a proportionable penalty. Nor, undoubtedly, could the solemn recognition of such a principle fail to render important public services. Yet these were far less than might have resulted from the system nakedly considered. Fasts of months, or years, or even of a whole life, were denounced against iniquities according to their several magnitudes. But then all this rigour was open to commutation. The same authority that had provided a scale of personal austerity had also provided an equivalent scale far more agreeable. If a penitent were disquieted by the prospect of a day's fast, a penny would release him from the obligation'. If he had incurred a more than common liability of this kind he might build a church, and ecclesiastical authorities would pronounce him free. Thus wealthy sinners found no great reason to tax the penitentials with intolerable severity. Nor was poverty left under the necessity of drawing an opposite conclusion. The repetition of psalms was pronounced highly meritorious3. Hence he who shrank from a fast, yet wanted means to commute it for money, might still appease an accusing conscience by a proportionate number of psalms'. Among the reading and thinking few, doubts appear to have been occasionally felt as to the soundness of this system; for it is recommended that repentance should not cease, although discipline may require nothing further, it being uncertain what value God may put upon such services'. But an observation of this kind was likely to pass unheeded amidst a vast mass of matter far more popular. Hence Anglo-Saxon penitential doctrines were calculated, upon the whole, to psalmos consecratos quos ego indignus et peccator decantare cupio in honorem nominis tui dni nri Ihu Xpi, et beatæ Mariæ semper virginis, et omnium scorum, pro me misero infelici, et pro cunctis facinoribus meis, sive factis, sive dictis, sive cogitationibus concu piscentus iniquitatibus, sive omnibus negligentiis meis magnis ac minimis; ut isti psalmi proficiant mihi ad vitam æternam, et remissionem omnium peccatorum et spatium adjuvando, et vivam penitentiam faciendo: per." Wanley refers this MS. vol. generally to the time of Edgar, or even to an earlier date; but he pronounces the prayer above, and many other things in the book, to have been written at a period far more recent.-HICKES, Thes. ii. 268. 1 He who owes one week on bread and water, let him sing 300 psalms, kneeling, or 320 without kneeling, as it is said above. And he who must do penance a month's space on bread and water, let him sing a thousand psalms and 200 kneeling, and without kneeling 1680.-Pœnitentiale D. Ecgbert. U |