Page:English Historical Review Volume 37.djvu/209

 1922 THE GREAT STATUTE OF PRAEMUNIRE 201 One is tempted to identify the statute on which the council were to rely with the act of 1393. The two writs correspond to the alternative modes of procedure sanctioned under that measure. 1 No one statute, so far as I know, could be made to cover both the offences with which Beaufort was charged, unless it were that of 1393, interpreted as involving everything preju- dicial to the Crown. Beaufort's acceptance of the cardinalate, we must remember, was not in itself an offence and was never treated as such. It was his retention of the bishopric of Win- chester and his alleged purchase of exemption from archiepiscopal jurisdiction that gave his enemies their chance. The king's attorney when impugning the first indiscretion seems to have relied on custom and precedent ; the second was an offence under the statute of 1401 which appeared in the petition of the clergy in 1447. It is possible, however, that Gloucester and his friends, after considering the results of research in the records and hearing the views of the judges, resolved to construe Beaufort's two dispensations as prejudicial to the Crown and therefore contrary to the statute of 1393. On the other hand, when in 1440 Gloucester drew up a long and solemn arraignment of Beaufort's career, he argued that the see of Winchester became void when Beaufort was made cardinal, that it was only some time afterwards that he received permis- sion to retain it, and that therefore he was technically appointed to it afresh by papal provision and so guilty of an offence against the statute of provisors. It is evident from this argument and from his allusions to the contents of the statute that he had in mind the act of 1390. As for Beaufort's exemption from the jurisdiction of Canterbury, that, in Gloucester's opinion, followed as a matter of course from his creation as cardinal. He says nothing of Beaufort's having purchased it, and it is probable that this charge, which seems to have rested on very weak evidence, had been dropped. 2 1 It was ordained that offenders ' soient attachez par lour corps sils purront estre trovez et amesnez devant le Boy et son Conseil pur y respondre. . . ou qe processe soit fait devers eux par premunire facias en manere come est ordeigne en autres estatutz des provisours et autres qui seuent en autry Courte en derogacion de la regalie notre aeignour le Roy ' (Statutes, ii. 86). of Winchestre. Wherupon he sewed to ... the pope to have a bulle declaratorie that notwithstanding that he was assumpt to the state of cardinal, that the see was not voied, where in dede it stode voied by a certayne tyme or that bulle was graunted, and so he was exempt from his ordinarie by the taking on hym the state of cardinal ; and the bisshopriche of the chirche of Winchester thanne standing voied, he toke it ageyn of the pope ; ye [sc. king] not leerned ne knowyng wherinne he was fallen in the cas of provision, wherby alle his goode was clerly and laufully forfaited to you . . . with more, as the statute declareth, for youre avauntage ' : Letters and Papers illustrative of the Wars of the English in France during the Reign of Henry VI (Rolls Ser.), ii. 442. The statement that the king might have got more than Beaufort's goods
 * * Item, the saide cardinal, thanne being bisshop, was assoylled of his bisshopriche