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cathedral by Gilla Isu (Grelasius), Primate of Annagh, early in the following year. This ap]>ointment of a native-bom Irishman and his consecration by the suc- cessor of St. Patrick marks the passine of Scandinav- ian supremacy in the Irish capital, and the emancipa- tion from canonical obedience to Canterbury which had obtained under the Danish bishops of Dublin. St. Lawrence soon set himself to effect numerous re- forms, commencing by converting the secular canons of Christ Church cathedral into Aroasian canons (1163). Three years later he subscribed to the foun- dation charter of All Hallows priory, Dublin (founded by Kins Dermot), for the same order of Austin can- ons. Not content with the strictest observance of rules, he wore a hair shirt underneath his episcopal dress, and practised the greatest austerity, retinng for an annual retreat of forty days to St. Kevin's cave, near Glendalough. At the second siege of Dublin (1170) St. Lawrence was active in ministration, and he showed his political foresight by paying due deference to Henry II of England, during that mon- arch's stay in Dublin. In April^ 1178, he entertained the papal legate. Cardinal Vivian, who pr^ided at the Synod of Dublin. He successfully negotiated the Treaty of Windsor, and secured good terms for Rod- eric, King of Connacht. He attended the Lateran Council in 1179, and returned as legate for Ireland. The holy prelate was not long in Dubun till he deemed it necessary again to visit Kmg Henry II (impelled by a burning charitv in the cause of King Roderic), and he cross^ to England in September of that year. After three weeks of detention at Abingdon Abbey, St. Lawrence followed the English King to Normandy. Taken ill at the Augustinian Abbey of Eu, he was tended by Abbot Osbert and the canons of St. Victor; before he breathed his last he had the consolation of- leaming that Kin^ Henry had acceded to his request. Messxnobam. Flonlegium (Paris, 1624); O'Hanlon, Life of St. Lawrence O'Toole (Dublin, 1S57); Hbalt, Ireland's Ancient Schools and Scholars (4th ed., Dublin, 1902).

W. H. Grattan-Flood.

Laxism. See Theology, Moral.

Lay Abbot {aJbhaiocomeSy abbas laicuSt abbas miles), a name used to designate a layman on whom a king or someone in authoritv bestowed an abbey as a reward for services rendered; he had charge of ^ the estate be- longing to it, and was entitled to Sart of the income. This baneful custom had a bad effect upon the life of the cloister. It existed principally in the Prankish Empire from the eighth century tifl the ecclesiastical reforms of the eleventh. Charles Martel (q. v.) was the first to bestow extensive ecclesiasticai property upon laymen, political friends, and warriors who had helped him in his campaigns. At an earlier period the French Merovingians Imd bestowed church tajids on laymen, or at least allowed them their pos- session ana use, though not ownership. Numerous 83niods held in France in the sixth ana seventh cen- turies passed decrees a^inst this abuse of church property. The French kmgs were also in the habit of appointing abbots to monasteries which they had founded; moreover, many monasteries, though not founded by the king, placed themselves under royal patronage in order to snare his protection, and so oe- came possessions of the Crown. This custom of the Merovmgian rulers of disposing of church property in individual cases, as also that of appointing abl)ots to monasteries founded by or belonging to themselves, was taken as a precedent by the French kings for re- warding laymen with abbeys, or giving them to bishops in commendam. Under Charles Martel the Church was greatly injured by this abuse, not only in her pos- sessions, but also in her religioiis life. St. Boniface and later Hincmar of Reims picture most dismally the conse<iuent tlownfall of church discipline, ana though St. Boniface tried sealously and even success-

fully to reform the Frankish Church, the bestowal of abt!eys on secular abbots was not entirely aliolished. Under Pepin the monks were permitted, in case their abbey should fall into secular hands, to go over to an- other community.

Charlemagne also frequently gave church property, and sometimes abbeys, in feudal tenure. It is true that Louis the Pious aided St. Benedict of Aniane in his endeavours to reform the monastic life. In order to accomplish this it was necessary to restore the free election of ablx)ts, and the appointment as well of blameless monks as heads of the monastic houses. Although Emperor Louis shared these principles, he continued to bestow abbeys on lajrmen, and his sons imitated him. The important Abbey of St. Riquier (Centula) in Picardy had secular abbots from the time of Charlemagne, who had given it to his friend Angilbert, the poet and the lover of his daughter Ber- tha, and father of her two sons (see Angilbert, Saint). After Angilbert's death in 814, the abbey was given to other laymen. Under such influences the CSiurch was bound to suffer; frequently the abbeys were scenes of worldliness and revelry. Various syn- ods of the ninth century passed decrees against this custom; the Synod of Dieaenhofen (October, 844) de- creed in its tlurd canon, that abbeys should no longer remain in the power of laymen, but that monks should be their abbots (Hefele, "Konziliengeschichte", 2nd ed., IV, 110). In like maimer the Synods of Meaux and Paris (845-846) complained that the monasteries held by laymen had fallen into decay, and emphasised the king's duty in this respect (op. cit., IV, 116). But abbeys continued to be bestowed upon laymen espe- cially in France and Lorraine, e. g. St. Evre near Toul, in the reign of Lothaire I. Lothaire II, however, restored it to ecclesiastical control in 858, but the same king gave Bonmoutier to a layman; and the Abbeys of St. Germain and St. Martin, in the Diocese of Toul, were also given to secular abbots. In the Dio- cese of Metz, the Abbey of Gorze was long in the hands of laymen, and imder them fell into decay. Stavelot and Malm^y, in the Diocese of Li^ge, were in the eleventh century bestowed on a certain Count Ragin- arius, as also St. Maximin near Trier on a Count Adal- hard, etc. (Hauck, " Kirchengeschichte Deutsch- land", II, 598). In 888 a Synod of Mainz decreed (can. xxv) that the secular abbots should place able provosts and provisors over their monasteries.

Coimcils, however, were unable to put an end to the evil; in a synod held at Trosly, in the Diocese of Sois- sons, in 909, sharp complaints were made (ch. iii) about the lives of monks; many convents, it was said, were governed by laymen, whose wives and children, soldiers and dogs, were housed in the precincts of the religious. To better these conditions it was neces- sary, the synod declared, to restore the regular abbots and abbesses; at the same time ecclesiastical canons and royal capitularies declared laymen quite devoid of authority in church affairs (Hefele, op. cit., IV, 572- 73). Lay abbots existed in the tenth century, also in the eleventh. Gosfred, Duke of Aquitainc, was Abbot of the monastery of St. Hilary at Poitiers, and as such he published the decrees issued (1078) at the Synod of Poitiers (Hefele, op. cit., V, 1 16). It was only through the so-called investitures conflict that the Church was freed from secular domination; the reform of religious and ecclesiastical life brought about by the papacy, put an end to the bestowal of ablwys upon laymen.

Thomaahinuh, Vetus et ?u)tx» eeclesia disciplina circa t»eneficia, part II. lib. II. c. 12 sqq. (Lyons. 1705, 686-622); Hefele. Historj/ of the Councils; Digbt. Ages of Faith; Fouter, British Mona»ticism; LnvoARD, Historjf of England (Dublin. 1878); D' Alton, History of Ireland; Stuart and Coleman. History of the Diocese of Armagh.

J. P. KiRSC'H.

Lay Baptism. See Baptism, sub-title XITI. Xiay Benefice. See Commjsndatoby Abbot.