Page:English Historical Review Volume 37.djvu/200

 192 THE GREAT STATUTE OF PRAEMUNIRE April dispute at all : on the interpretation that I have suggested it only touched the fringe of the question, while if given a wider significance it would have raised a much broader issue, some allusion to which must have appeared in the correspondence that was exchanged. Furthermore, if the statute of 1393 covered all encroachments on temporal affairs, the repeal of the statute of 1390 would have availed the pope nothing ; while, on the other hand, the repeal of the statute of 1393 would have left that of 1390 in force. To secure liberty of conferring English benefices the pope would have been obliged to get rid of both measures. Yet, as we have seen, it was for the repeal of but one statute that Chichele pleaded before the commons, and his conduct on that occasion was considered by observers to be proof of zeal in the pope's cause, and satisfied even Martin V himself. 1 There seems then good reason to believe that the popes of the forty years after the passing of the statute of 1393 were little if at all perturbed by it, and there is apparently no evidence that they took any formal notice of it. Thus the wording of the act itself, the circumstances in which it was passed, and the general disregard of it for so many years point alike to the conclusion that it was originally a measure of but limited purpose, intended by those who framed it to protect ecclesiastics from punishment for executing the sentences of secular courts and to prevent arbitrary translations of bishops. But why, it may be asked, was such an act required ? Did not existing statutes provide adequate safeguards against such exercise of papal authority ? The statute of 1390 ordained that if any person brought or sent into the realm summonses, sentences, or excommunications directed against any one for proposing, assenting to, or executing 1 Cal. of Papal Letters, viii. 64. It has sometimes been argued that, as the anti- papal legislation had not been enforced, Martin V was not seriously concerned about it, and merely used it as a stick for beating Chichele, who (according to this view) had been encouraging the English church in a display of independence somewhat alarming to the papacy. But, whatever motives led the pope to make his attack on Chichele which, it should be noted, began in 1423 on another issue (Raynaldus, Annales, xxvii. 573 ; Cal. of Papal Letters, vii. 12) it is clear from the papal registers that throughout his pontificate the statute of provisors was operating effectively, and, with the exception of bishoprics, very few English benefices were filled by the pope. Martin's attempt to secure some redress began in 1419 ; it was resumed at intervals during the next nine years, and renewed by Eugenius IV in 1435 (Foedera, ix. 806 ; Raynaldus, Annales, xxvii. 538, 556 ; xxviii. 20 ; Wilkins, iii. 471 seqq. ; Cal. of Papal Letters, viii. 216 seqq., 263). That he was in earnest is shown by the mere fact that he addressed himself mainly to the king ; it was not till late in 1426 that he sought to stimulate Chichele's activity in the cause. Moreover, Eugenius IV seems to have had no suspicion that when Chichele was reconciled to the Holy See, the incident was really closed. One gathers, not merely from official documents but from informal corre- spondence preserved in William Swan's letter- book, that Martin's efforts were taken quite seriously both at Rome and in England. It is, therefore, important to notice the precise terms in which the papal demands were urged.