when Ayleward, the abbot there, had unworthily digged open his grave, he (the abbot) fell mad, and going out of church brake his neck and died." 7 A. D. 1054. Griffith, the valiant and victorious king of North Wales, in aid of Algar, earl of Chester, whom king Edward the Confessor had expelled and banished, invadeth Herefordshire, putteth to flight Radulf, earl thereof, and son of Goda, the Confessor's sister, with his whole army, and taking the city of Hereford, fired the cathedral church, slew Leogar (the bishop) and seven of the canons that defended it, bnrnt also the monastery built by bishop Æthelstane, carried away the spoil thereof, and of the city, with slaughter of the citizens, and fully restored Algar the earl both now and a second time. Upon this king Edward sent Harald against him; who, upon his second voyage into North Wales, burnt his palace and ships. After this, Griffith raising an army for revenge, and going to meet Harald, was by his own people traitorously murdered, and his head brought to Harald. Circ. A.D. 1068. Alfgarus, stalhere (that is, constable of the army) to Edward the Confessor," invaded the town of Estre, otherwise called Plassie, and pulling it from the monastery of Ely, converted it to his own use. The abbot and monks there besought him by all fair means to restore it, but 6 [The Editors have here omitted a repetition, in other words, of the last paragraph.] 7 HOVED. in A. D. 1055. HOLINSH. p. 866. prevailing not, they proceeded to denounce daily curses and imprecations against him, and at last (although he were so great a person in the kingdom) to excommunicate him. Hereupon the king reproving him sharply, and the people shunning his company, he at last sought to be reconciled to the church, and for obtaining thereof granted by his deed, and ratified by his oath, that the town after his decease should again return to the monastery: yet (after the death of Edward the Confessor, and Harold the usurper) he was by the Conqueror cast into prison, and there, among others in fetters of iron, ended his life. A.D. 1078. Jordan, prince of Capua, hearing that the bishop of Rosella had brought and laid up a good sum of money in the monastery of Monte-Cassino, in Italy, sent his soldiers, and by force took it out of the treasury of the church; but was shortly after stricken blind." Upon this Gregory the Seventh calleth a council, and maketh a canon against sacrilege; and writing to Jordan, reproveth him for this and other offences, admonishing him to amend them.' The prince, touched with remorse, granteth in recompence, the next year after, to the monastery of Cassino, divers great territories and privileges, with a penalty of £5000 of gold upon the violators thereof." LEO. MARSIC. lib. iii. cap. 45. 1 BARON. A. D. 1078, 24. 2 LEO. MARSIC. lib. iit. cap. 46. SECTION II. RICHARD, Robert, and Anesgot, sons of William Sorenge, in the time of William, duke of Normandy, wasting the country about Say, invaded the church of S. Gervase, lodging their soldiers there, and making it a stable for their horses. God deferred not the revenge: for Richard escaping, on a night, out of a cottage where he was beset with his enemies, a boor, whom he had fettered a little before, lit upon him, and with an hatchet clave his head asunder. Robert, having taken a prey about Soucer, was pursued by the peasants and slain. Anesgot, entering and sacking of Cambray, was struck in the head with a dart, thrown downward on him, and so died. Lo, (saith Gemeticensis) we have here seen that truly performed which we have heard: If any man shall violate the temple of God, God shall destroy him.3 And admonishing such as spoil churches to look about them, and not to soothe themselves in their sin, for that God often deferreth the punishment, he concludeth with these verses of another man's:1 Vos male gaudetis quia tandem suscipietis Dear bought, for thou must one day undergo God's threats are sure, though mercy be among them, 3 1 Cor iii. 17. 4 GUL. GEMETIC. de Ducum Normannorum Gestis, lib. vi. cap. 13, 14. William the Conqueror, in making the forest of Ytene, commonly called the New Forest, is reported to have destroyed twenty-six towns, with as many parish churches, and to have banished both men and religion for thirty miles in length, to make room for his deer. He had ruined also some other churches in France upon occasion of war; and in Lent-time, in the fourth year of his reign, he rifled all the monasteries of England of the gold and silver which was laid up there by the richer of the people to be protected by the sanctity of the places from spoil and rapine; and of that also which belonged to the monasteries themselves, not sparing either the chalices or shrines. But He That in the like attempt met with Heliodorus, met with him also grievously, both in his person and posterity. Touching his person, as God raised Absalom against David, so raised He Robert, duke of Normandy, against his father the Conqueror, and fought a battle with him by the castle of Gerborie in France, where the Conqueror himself was unhorsed, his son William wounded, and many of their family slain. Hereupon the Conqueror (as casting oil into the fire of God's wrath that was kindled to consume his own family) cursed his son Robert, which to his dying day wrought fearfully upon him, as shall by-and-bye appear. But to proceed with the Conqueror himself: it is very remarkable, that being so great and renowned a king, he was no sooner dead, but his corpse was forsaken of his children, brethren, friends, servants, and followers, and wickedly left (saith Stow) as a barbarous person, not one of his knights being found to take care of his exequies : so that a country knight, out of charity, was moved to take care thereof, and conveying the corpse to Caen in Normandy, the abbat and monks of S. Stephen's there, with the rest of the clergy and laity of the town, met it reverently; but in conducting it to the church, a terrible fire broke out of a house, and spreading suddenly over a great part of the town, the whole company was dispersed, and only the monks left to end the office begun. The funeral, notwithstanding, proceeded afterwards in great solemnity, the bishops and abbats of Normandy attending it: but when the mass was done, and that the bishop of Evreux, at the end of his sermon, had desired all that were present to pray for the dead prince, and charitably to forgive him if he had offended any of them; one Anselm Fitz-Arthur, rising up, said aloud, "The ground whereon ye stand was the floor of my father's house, and the man for whom ye make intercession took it violently from him while he was duke of Normandy, and founded this house upon it: I now therefore claim my own, and forbid him that took it away by violence to be covered with my earth, or to be buried in my inheritance." The bishops and nobility hearing this, and understanding it to be true by the testimony of others, presently compounded with the party in fair manner, giving him sixty shillings in |