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Mayence. After many years, although an old man of 70, he went again to Friesland, where there were still many remnants of paganism. Here his zeal outran his discretion, and the heathens, enraged by his destruction of their idols, attacked and slew both him and his converts. He courted this fate, believing that a long missionary life would be most fitly crowned at last by the glory of martyrdom. In each place where he had ministered he left behind him disciples, who continued his work of civilising the barbarous tribes of Western Europe; and, thus to missionaries from this country may be traced a share of the peace and good order which marked the empire over which Charlemagne ruled. The Christianity of Gaul, to which the Celtic Church of Britain owed so much, had been depreciated, if not almost destroyed, by a similar Teutonic invasion to that which drove the Faith from the east of Britain, and after it was revived to some extent by means of the Celtic missionaries, Boniface, by his influence and experience, was able to reform, consolidate, and organise the whole ecclesiastical system within the Frankish dominions. We honour his memory on June 5.

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BONIFACE DESTROYING THOR'S OAK.

7. Early Benefactions to the Church. - Very much has been said in recent times respecting the charters (i.e., writings, or deeds of gift) which were granted to the Church by Anglo-Saxon Kings. Our museums contain several thousands of these documents, mostly in the handwriting of the monks. The Codex Diplomaticus of Mr. Kemble, and the Cartularium Saxonicum of Mr. de Gray Birch, have placed large numbers of them within our reach in readable form, and so helped the Church to prove the title

to her property incontrovertibly. Before the monasteries set the example of registering the transfer of possessions on parchment or paper, our ancestors contented themselves with the transference of property in the presence of witnesses; for example, if land were to be conveyed, a turf would be cut and given to the new owner in the presence of the other people of the neighbourhood; in similar fashion to the old patriarchal method by which Boaz obtained the inheritance of Elimelech from Naomi. But the literary monks introduced to this country a more excellent way. The Church was to live on, they knew, when the petty states would no longer exist; after the donors and the witnesses had gone to their long home. There would be difficulty, they foresaw, in proving their right to estates and buildings, when a conquering prince desired to alienate them, if they were restricted for evidence to living testimony; so they enumerated in written documents full particulars of any property given to the Church; and this practice was afterwards adopted for all important transfers, even by the laity, although it was a long time before the ancestral usage was dropped. The writings were only looked upon as additional security. Thus, in a royal grant of the 8th century, the King is made to say:

"But because there is need of care lest our grant of to-day be in the future disowned and called in question, I have thought fit to prepare this document (hane paginam), and together with a turf of the foresaid land to deliver it to thee; whereby I prevent not only my successors, whether kings or princes, but also my own self, from dealing otherwise at any time with the said land than as it is now settled by me."

When a king gave any buildings or lands to the Church he gave either from his own possessions or else from those which he had acquired by conquest over some other king, distributing some estates to this or that monastery as an act of thankfulness to the Giver of all victory, in the same way as he would reward the faithfulness of the barons who assisted him by the grant of some other part of the conquered territory. But kings were not the only benefactors, the nobles were glad to follow their example; and every local or county history furnishes abundant evidence that the earliest benefactions to the Church were individual and personal gifts. No one has ever yet been able to find documentary proof of an uniform tribute, oficially demanded by the kings, from the people generally, for the support of the Church. The essence of such gifts as the Church received, if the documents be true, is that they were voluntary. Thus we read that Offa, king of Mercia, gave a tenth part of "all his own things" (ommium rerum suarum) "to Holy Church," and a Kentish deed of A.D. 832 contains the following grant to Canterbury Cathedral :

"I, Luba, the humble handmaid of God, appoint and establish these foresaid benefactions and alms from my heritable land at Mundlingham to the brethren at Christ Church; and I entreat, and in the name of the living God I command, the man who may have this land and this inheritance at Mundlingham, that he continue these benefactions to the world's end. The man who will keep and discharge this that I have commanded in this writing, to him be given and kept the heavenly blessing; he who hinders or neglects it to him be given and kept the punishment of hell, unless he will repent with full amends to God and to men. Fare ye well."

The conditions relating to the inviolable nature of this gift were very common stipulations at the time, suggested without doubt by the monks, who had some experience already of the tendency to encroach upon Church property, and withhold or subtract the contributions to it which were thus made a first charge upon estates. As in Luba's gift, so in other benefactions to the Church; they were bestowed upon the particular church or community which the donor desired to benefit, to be used by that community or church, and by no other; in accordance with the conditions of the 3rd canon of the synod of Hertford, which forbade the alienation of property from any religious house to another. In the year 854 we find that King Ethelwulf and several of his bishops, abbots, and nobles agreed to make grants from their individual properties for the maintenance of the Church, and these became recoverable at common law. This was a distinctly voluntary proceeding, which bound no one else to similar contributions, as is clear from the concluding terms of the charter they drew up :

"And if anyone is willing to increase our donation, may the Omnipotent God increase his prosperous days. But if anyone shall dare to diminish or disallow it, let him understand that he will have to render an account before the tribunal of Christ, unless he previously amends by giving satisfaction."

These selections from Anglo-Saxon documents are typical instances of the way in which the Church acquired its property in early times, and they serve to show that the intention of the donors was then the same as it is now-to dedicate something of their own proper good to the service of God for ever. The proportion given would of course depend on the prosperity of the donor, and so we find some districts and parishes benefited much more largely than others. This is the case with modern donations also, hence the irregular distribution of Church funds, and the difference in dignity and grandeur of Church buildings. Had there been at this or any other time, as some suggest, an uniform official endowment, there would have been less variation in these respects. The longer the Church retains such property the more inviolable will be its right thereto, for, although it is continually receiving fresh proofs of the affection of its members, it still retains many of these ancient benefactions; notwithstanding that wicked men in every age have risked the curses entailed upon their alienation, by taking to themselves the property of God in possession. Tithes, i.e., a tenth part of certain properties originally given for the support of the Church, of which we hear so much in the present day, are very much more ancient benefactions to the Church than such donations as have been referred to. The faithful converts were taught from the earliest times the scriptural duty of contributing a tenth of their substance for the support of the ministry; but in the 8th century, when Northumbria still held the civil supremacy, we have documentary evidence of their official recognition; for in the canons drawn up by Egbert, first archbishop of York, it was decreed as follows :

"That the churches anciently established be despoiled neither of their tithes nor other property to give them to new places of worship."

The decrees of the synod held at Chelsea, A.D. 787, at which Offa made the grant we have referred to, show us that tithes were also voluntary contributions, because the 19th canon earnestly entreats all to make a point of giving tithe "because it is God's special portion." Augustine of Canterbury had by the advice of Gregory the Great, adopted a plan for dividing the contributions of the faithful into four separate funds, one for the bishop, a second for the clergy, a third for Church fabrics, and a fourth for the poor. This was when the bishop had the management of the common fund, to which all benefactions were at one time paid. Afterwards, when people gave for special purposes, this custom, which never had canonical force, fell through. The bishops and clergy had their separate estates to administer as they chose, and the monasteries theirs. Then the poor were relieved, sheltered, fed, and employed by the monks and clergy, so that the religious houses became hospitals for all, the secular exchequer being thus relieved from all responsibility on account of the needy; a state of things which continued until the monasteries were destroyed. It is alleged by some opponents of the Church in modern times that a share of the tithes was at some time or other made divisible by law amongst the poor, but there is no historical evidence for such an assertion.

8. Royal Devotees. --So great was the prosperity of the AngloSaxon Church in the 8th century, and so much respected were its devotees, that it was not at all unusual for kings to leave their high estate and adopt the habit of a "religious;" to make pilgrimages to the places where the relics of saints and martyrs were enshrined, and offer thereat munificent alms; to walk even to the city of Rome barefooted and in rags, and establish hospitals there for the reception of travellers from Britain, or schools for the education of British children, and perhaps to end their days in the solitude of a cell of a monastery which they had been instrumental in founding. Some of these royal zealots were really actuated by religious fervour, others by the desire of relaxation from the cares of State or the wish for adulation of a novel kind; others, again, only adopted these practices in expiation of a long course of criminal indulgence. One of the best was Ina, king of Wessex, the same who conquered West Wales, and who was persuaded by Aldhelm to rebuild and endow Glastonbury Abbey. As the story goes, Ethelburh, his queen, persuaded him to renounce his royal state by a very strange device. After feasting his baróns one day in right royal fashion he went forth from his palace to go to another of his castles accompanied by the Queen, who, before she left, had instructed the stewards to dismantle the house, hide its treasures, fill it with rubbish, and put a sow with a litter of pigs in the King's bed. Before they had proceeded far on their journey the Queen asked Ina to return, and after showing him over the defiled palace, bade him consider the vanity of earthly pomp, and urged him

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