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 A HISTORY OF LONDON number of heretics who used to meet in London at midnight to study forbidden books."^ One eiffect of the ill-feeling in the City against the parsons and the ecclesiastical courts seems to have been an increase in the popularity of the friars and the Minoresses. In September 15 14 the Court of Aldermen con- sented to visit the house of the Grey Friars yearly on the Feast of St. Francis.'" Next year the City companies raised money for repaving their church,"* and Dr. Henry Standish, a provincial of the order, gained popularity in London by maintaining that the Act -" restricting benefit of clergy to those in orders was not against the liberty of the Church. A hot controversy followed, which seems to have had some connexion with Hun's case, partly because Dr. Horsey's privilege as a clergyman is said to have been used to keep him ' out of the hands of the temporalty,' "** but also because Hun's popularity may have been gained by his attempt to stop with a suit of praemunire pro- ceedings in one of the ecclesiastical courts whose power was threatened by the Act. Dr. Standish gave lectures in St. Paul's and elsewhere in support of his views, and was summoned before Convocation to answer a charge of heresy.-" He was chosen to preach the Spital sermon on Easter Monday both in 1517"* and 15 18.-" On the former occasion he wisely refused ' to move the mayor and aldermen to take part with the comminaltie against the strangers ' ; the riot on the following ' Evil May Day ' began in consequence of the Tuesday sermon, which was preached by a canon of St. Mary Spital.-^" The wills enrolled in the Court of Husting during the first twenty years of the 1 6th century-*^ give little indication of a lessening of devotion to the Church. Possibly some of the frequent bequests of money for pious or social purposes to the trade fraternities would have been made at an earlier period to purely religious organizations,"'^ but out of fifty wills of that period twenty contain bequests to parish churches and nine to religious houses, of which St. Thomas of Aeon is still the favourite. The devotion of the citizens at this period, however, was chiefly shown in the rebuilding and adornment of parish churches. This had been going on throughout the 1 5th century, but is a special characteristic of the first quarter of the i6th. Handsome gifts or large bequests towards it were made by the companies and by rich citizens, including several mayors ; the clergy and the poorer parishioners also shared in the good work. For example, when the church of St. Andrew Undershaft was rebuilt in 1520, every man put to his helping hand, ' some with their purses, others with their bodies.' -'* "■ More, Dialogue, ut sup. '" Rec. Corp. Letter Bk. M, fol. 224. ; cf. Monum. Franc. (Rolls Ser.), ii, 186. '"* Rec. Corp. Letter Bk. M, fol. 237. For the other orders see also Sharpe, Lond. and the Kingdom, i, 401 ; Rec. Corp. Letter Bk. N, fol. 1 83; Joum. xii, fol. 75; Repert. iv, fol. 122^. =" Stat. 4 Hen. VIII, cap. 2. '"« L. and P. Hen. Fill, ii, 131 3. '" Ibid. For discussions of the case see Gairdner, op. cit. 41—50, and Maitland, Canon Law in Ch. of Engl. 87. »" Hall, Chron. 8 Hen. VIII. '" Rec. Corp. Letter Bk. N, fol. 99. '»" Hall, Chron. 9 Hen. MIL '5' Sharpe, Cal. ii, 603-29. "* Cf. the action of Colet in making the Mercers' Company governors of St. Paul's School. The Gold- smiths' Company began c. 1493 to distinguish their 'testament lands' from their 'proper lands' ; Prideaur, Mem. of Goldsmiths, i, 31. For religious bequests of this period see ibid. 36, 37, 44. '^ Stow, Surv. (ed. Kingsford), i, 109 and passim ; ed. Munday, 472 ; Chwdns.' Accts., St. Andrew Hubbard 1,20-1, All Hallows London Wall 1528, St. Andrew Holborn (Bentley's Reg.) 1446-7 ; Lond. Epis. Reg. Kemp, pt. iii, fol. 12 ; Z-. and P. Hen. Fill, iii, 1034. 238