Evils aris

ing from

against provisors.

1399.

acknowledged the claim of Martin. If the schism was thus terminated, it had previously given a shock to the temporal authority of the pontiffs, from which it never recovered. The contending rivals dared not employ the imperious tone of their predecessors. It was the policy of each to conciliate, to increase the number of his adherents, and to avoid every measure which might drive men to seek the friendship of his opponent. Hence the pretensions which had given so much offence to the sovereigns, were allowed to fall into desuetude; enactments, hostile to the immunities or claims of the church, were either passed over in silence, or but feebly opposed; and instead of the spiritual weapons of excommunication and interdict, were adopted the more persuasive means of entreaty and concession.

In England the duration of the schism had allowed the statutes the statutes against provisors to be executed with little opposition. Experience, however, shewed that they operated in a way, which had never been contemplated, to the depression of learning, and the deterioration of the universities. Both these bodies, in the year 1399, presented petitions to the convocation, setting forth, that while the popes were permitted to confer benefices by provision, the preference had always been given to men of talents and industry, who had obtained degrees in the universities; and that the effect of such preference had been to quicken the application, and multiply the number of the students: but that, since the passing of the acts against provisors, their members had been neglected by the patrons, the students had disappeared, and the schools were nearly abandoned '. Wilk. Con. iii. 242.

The evil continued to increase. Sixteen years later it attracted the notice of the commons, who, to preserve the universities from utter destruction, petitioned the king, that the statutes against provisors might be repealed, or an adequate remedy might be provided '. He informed them that he had referred the matter to the bishops. But these prelates had no wish that the statutes should be repealed: and in convocation a law was published, obliging every spiritual patron during the next ten years to bestow the first vacant benefice in his presentation, and after that every second or some member of either university, graduated in one of the three faculties of divinity, law, or physic. It was hoped that this expedient would silence their complaints; though on account of objections raised by the universities themselves, four years elapsed before it was put in execution 2. The truth is, that the persons who chiefly suffered from the practice of provisions, and who chiefly profited by the statutes against them, were the higher orders of the clergy. These, as their right of presentation was invaded by the exercise of the papal claim, had originally provoked the complaints, which the reader has so frequently noticed; and now were ready to submit to a minor sacrifice, rather than allow the repeal of the statutes, which secured to them the influence of patronage, and shielded them from the interference of the pontiffs.

3

Wilk. Conc. iii. 381. 401.

3 I profit of this open space to notice a singular assertion of Hume at the close of his nineteenth chapter: that « the first commission « of array which we meet with, was issued by Henry V. in 1415:

५

when the feudal militia gave place to one which was still less

« orderly and regular. » The fact is, that such commissions were usual in every reign since Henry II. See vol. ii. p. 365, and vol. iv. P. 153.

1416.

1417.

1421.

TERS OF THE YORKISTS.

DUKE OF

DISAS

IS KILLED AT

THEIR SUBSEQUENT SUCCESS.
DUKE IS DECLARED HEIR TO THE THRONE.

-

WAKEFIELD.

CLAIMED KING.

HIS SON EDWARD ENTERS LONDON.

AND IS PRO

THE French throne was preserved from ruin by the premature death of Henry V. The task of maintaining the ascendency which he had gained, devolved on an infant successor, and a divided ministry while the dauphin, in the vigour of youth, and seconded by the wishes of the people, called the different factions under his banner, and directed their combined efforts against

the invaders of their country. We shall see that prince recover in the course of a few years the crown of his ancestors; expel the English from their conquests; and seal a long series of success with the subjugation of Gascony, the last fragment of the ancient patrimony belonging to the English monarchs in France.

of the go vernment.

1422. Nov. 17.

The new king, the son of Henry and Catharine, was Settlement hardly nine months old. On the first advice of his father's decease, several spiritual and temporal peers assembled at Westminster; issued commissions in the name of Henry VI. to the judges, sheriffs, and other officers, to continue the exercise of their respective duties; and summoned a parliament to meet in the beginning of November. The first care of that assembly was to ratify all the acts of the authority by which it had been convened, as sufficiently justified by the necessity of the case ' : its second, to supply the defect arising in the exercise of the royal authority from the infancy of the king. The two last centuries furnished three instances of minorities, at the accession of Henry III., Edward III., and Richard II. But on none of these occasions had the powers of the executive government been intrusted to a guardian or regent, if we except the two first years of Henry III., when the appointment of such an officer was deemed requisite to oppose the pretensions of a foreign competitor at the head of a powerful army, and in possession of the capital. The duke of Glocester, however, preferred a claim to the regency on two grounds: because in the absence of the duke of Bedford he was the nearest of kin to his nephew; and because the late king, when he lay on his death-bed, had appointed him to that charge. The lords Rot. Parl. iv. 170.

Dec. 5.

(for such matters did not appertain to the cognizance
of the commons) having searched the rolls, and con-
sulted the judges, replied that his demand was not
founded either on law or precedent, but was contrary
to the constitution of the realm, and the rights of the
three estates and that the appointment of the late king
was of no force, because he could not alter the law of
the land without the three estates, nor delegate the
authority which expired with his life, to be exercised
by another after his death. To satisfy him, however, as
far as was in their power, they would appoint him pre-
sident of the council, in the absence of his brother the
duke of Bedford, not with the title of regent, lieute-
nant, governor, or tutor, words which might be
construed to import a delegation of the sovereign
authority, but with that of «< protector of the realm and
<< church of England » : an appellation, which could
serve only to remind him of his duty'. Acting on these
principles they named the chancellor, treasurer, and
keeper of the privy seal, and sixteen members of the
council with the duke of Bedford, and in his absence,
the duke of Glocester, for president: and by a deputa-
tion notified these nominations to the commons, who
gave
their assent 2. Regulations were then enacted for

Ibid. iv. 326.

2 Ibid. iv. 174, 175. 326. Their salaries were as follows:

The bishop of Winchester, when he was chancellor, received the same as an archbishop, and the lord Stafford, as treasurer,

1

the same