84
LITERATURE.
the exhibition of " Spectnla," or similar direr- dons, in the cemetery of his cathedral.*
1404. In a parliament held at Coventry, which £rom its desire to compel the clergy to contribute largely to the state, was called the Laymen's Parliament The country was in imminent dan- ger, an abundantsupply of money was immediately necessary; the parliament knew that the pro- fusion of ecclesiastical wealth could only hare been acquired from the industry of the laity; and they represented that the clergy had been of little service to the kin|;, while the lai^r had served in his wars with their persons, and by contributions for the same purpose bad impoverished their estates. The archbishop of Canterbury, (Arundel) said that if the clergy did not fight in person, their tenants fought for them, that their contri- butions bad been in proportion to their property, and the church had offered prayers and masses day and night for God's blessmg on the king and the army. .The Speaker, Sir John Cheyne, an- swered, that the prayers of the church were a very slender supply. To this the archbishop replied, that it mignt easily be seen what woula become of the kingdom when such devout addresses were so slighted. The persistance of the archbishop saved the church from the impeding stonu.
Amidst the ardour of the prelates for the sup- pression of novel opinions, and for impeding the progress of reformation, it might have been ex- pected that their ovm favourite study, that of scholastic theology, would have been vigorously pursued. This species of divinity was, indeed cultivated to a certain degree : but it did not appear with the splendour which it had assumed in former ages. No such luminaries were pro- duced as had heretofore obtained the pompous titles : there were no persons who attained the appellations of irrefragable, angelic, or seraphic doctors. The bishops chiefly concerned them- selves in supporting the general pretensions of the church, or in framing canons for the main- tenance of their separate interests. The poems of Chaucer abound with invective against the vicesof the clergy, particular? the Plowman's Tale: an example or two will sufficiently discover the tenor of the poem. ^
Socb as can nat ysay tber crde. With prayer sbal be made prelatea; Mother canne thei the ^spell rede, Sach shul now weldia hei estates. They use horedome and harlottrie, And covetise, and porape. and pride. And Blothe, and wrathe, and eke envie, And sewine sinne by every side.
As Goddcs godeness no man tell might, Ne write, ne spelce, ne thlnlt in thought. So thcr falshed, and ther unright, Male DO man tell tint ere God wronglit
< AninterdictionofaBimilarnaturcisfoundamongthe statutes of the synod of the church of Diei^, A. D. 1 387; by which Joculators or minstrels, actors and dancers are forbidden performing in the church, ccmctry, or portico.
The porticiis, or portico, was not the same with what is usually called the church-porch, but either wiiat is now commonly called the side-isle, or a particular division off it, consisting of one arch with its recess, aud was fre- quently distiDgnished by the name of some saint, as Porticns Sti. Martini in St. Angnstln's church at Canter- bury.
1404, Jan. 13. It was enacted by the shoitM pEU-liament on the statute rolls, that none (refer- ing to the chemists) from henceforth shall use to multiply gold and silver, or use the craft of multiplication; and if any do the same do, he shall mcur the pain of felony. It was repealed 1 William and Mary.
1406. Henry Beda, a priest, bequeathed his manuscript breviary to the church of Jacques- la-Boucherie, he left at the same time, to William I'Exale, the churchwarden of the said church, the sum of forty sols, to pay the expense of having a cage nutdein whicn the breviary might be kept. — Magann Pictiiretmie.
1408, Augntt 17. Died John Gower, a cele- brated English poet, whom Chaucer styles the " moral Gower." He was born in Yorkshire about 1320, and became eminent as a professor of law in the Inner Temple, and is supposed to have been Chief Justice of die Common Pleas. His works consist of three parts. Speculum Me- dilantit; Vox Clamantii; andConfeaioAma»tii. They were printed by Caxton in 1483.
It is pleasant to observe the strange mistakes and anachronisms which Gower, a man of great learning, and the most general scholar of his age, has committed in his Confemo Amantit, con- cerning books which he never saw, his violent anachronisms and misrepresentations of the most common poets and characters: he mentions the Greek Poet Menander as one of the first his- torians, or, to quote his own expression, "the first enditours of the olde cionike, together with Esdras, Solinus, Josephus, Claudius Salpiciua, Termegis, Pandulfe, Frigidilles, Ephiloquorus, and Pandas. In this list, the omissions of^ which are as curious as the insertions, we are equally at a loss to account for the station assigned to some of the names as to the existence of others, which it would require an (Edipus to unriddle.
In the next paragraph, it is true he mentions Herodotus; yet not in his character of an early historian, but as the first writer of a system of the metrical art, " of metre, of ryme, and of ca- dence." We smile when' Hector, in Shakes- peare, quotes Aristotle; but Gower gravely informs his reader that Ulysses was a cfcrfc, accomplished with a knowledge of all the sciences, a great rhetorician and magician; that he learned rhetoric of TuUy, magic of Zoroaster, astronomy of Ptolomy, philosophy of Plato, di- vination of the prophet Daniel, proverbial in- struction of Solomon, botany of Macer, and medicine of Hippocrates. Arid in the seveatb book of the poem, Aristotle or the philotopkm. is introduced reciting to his scholar Alexaodct the Great, a disputation between s Jew and a Pagan, who meet between Cairo and Babylon, concerning their respective religions : the end ol this story is to shew the cunnmg, cruelty, and ingratitude of the Jew, which are, at last, de- servedly punished. But I believe Gower's apo- logy must be, that he took this narrative from some Christian Legend, which was feigned for a religious purpose, at the expense of all pro- bability and propriety.
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