Solution Manual for MGMT 9th Edition Williams 1305661591

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Chapter 5 Planning and Decision Making

TRUEFALSE

1. Planning encourages persistence even when there may be little chance of short-term success.

(A) True

(B) False

Answer : (A)

2. Specific, challenging goals provide a target for which to aim and a standard against which to
measure success.

(A) True (B)

False

Answer : (A)

3. The first step in planning is to develop effective action plans.

(A) True

(B) False

Answer : (B)

4. Research indicates that the effectiveness of goal setting can be doubled by the addition of
feedback.

(A) True (B)

False

Answer : (A)

5. The purpose of options-based planning is to commit people and resources to a particular course of
action.
(A) True (B)

False

Answer : (B)

6. Once a strategic objective has been accomplished, a new one should be chosen.
(A) True (B)

False

Answer : (A)

7. The more criteria a potential solution meets, the better that solution will be.

(A) True

(B) False

Answer : (A)

8. The nominal group technique improves group decision making by decreasing a-type conflict.

(A) True

(B) False

Answer : (A)

9. The nominal group technique typically produces better decisions than the devil's advocacy and
dialectical inquiry approaches.

(A) True (B)

False

Answer : (B)

10. The Delphi technique is a decision-making method in which group members cast votes to select
solutions.

(A) True (B)

False

Answer : (B)

MULTICHOICE

11. Which of the following statements is true of planning?

(A) It fixes all organizational problems.

(B) It creates an environment of uncertainty.

(C) It discourages employees from working hard.

(D) It intensifies the effort put in by managers and employees.

Answer : (D)

12. Which of the following is a benefit of planning?

(A) It fixes all organizational problems.

(B) It decreases persistence toward goals.

(C) It gives direction to managerial efforts.

(D) It reduces the motivation of employees to achieve goals.

Answer : (C)

13. Which of the following is a disadvantage of planning?

(A) It increases employee turnover.

(B) It creates a false sense of certainty.

(C) It decreases the effort put in by managers and employees.

(D) It discourages employees from working hard for long periods.

Answer : (B)

14. A drawback of planning is that:

(A) it does not provide direction to managerial activities.

(B) it causes detachment, which leads planners to plan for things they do not understand.

(C) managers tend to put in minimal efforts when following a plan.

(D) planning decreases persistence among employees.

Answer : (B)

15. The operations manager of a car manufacturing company in the U.S. wants to set up factories in
three other countries by the end of the current year. After he has set this goal, which of the
following is the next step he should take in order to achieve this goal?

(A) Analyze the profits the factories will make

(B) Track progress toward goal achievement

(C) Develop commitment to the goal

(D) Set up effective action plans

Answer : (C)

16. The most popular approach to increase goal commitment is to .

(A) assign goals to workers

(B) set goals participatively

(C) ask the top management to assign goals

(D) delegate decision-making authority to workers

Answer : (B)

17. The manager of a packaging and shipping company has set a goal of increasing the customer
base by 2.5 percent in the next two months. In this scenario, the manager has set a .

(A) distal goal (B)

quixotic goal (C)

visionary goal (D)

proximal goal

Answer : (D)

18. The last step in effective planning is to .

(A) maintain flexibility in planning

(B) develop commitment to goals

(C) develop long-term action plans

(D) track progress toward goal achievement

Answer : (A)

19. Omega Corp. has a goal of increasing its production and reducing its overhead costs. To achieve
this goal, the company has developed four alternate action plans. Its idea is to monitor how these
plans work and then invest more in the plan that shows maximum results. This type of planning that
allows for flexibility is known as .

(A) reverse planning

(B) options-based planning

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 On this second occasion she received the personal hospitality of
Abbot Estney. Islip was but a novice at the time but he could not have
helped knowing of the important events which were happening within
the monastery itself. Moreover Elizabeth’s name was already honoured
in the community as the donor of the new chapel of St. Erasmus erected
in 1478, probably at the west door of the old Lady Chapel.
When in 1486 she was restored to her full rights as queen-dowager
she could think of no more pleasant place to live than in the monastery
which had formerly sheltered her, and the Abbot’s house called
Cheyneygates (the present Deanery) was leased to her for forty years.
She lived there, however, but a few months, for in 1487 her lands were
again forfeited and she retired to end her days in the abbey of
Bermondsey.
In the summer of the year 1491, probably in the month of June, Prior
Robert Essex died, and in July the Westminster students were summoned
from Oxford to assist in the election of his successor. Among them was
Roger Blake, and upon him fell the choice of the Convent. He survived
his appointment, however, only a few weeks, and by Michaelmas George
Fascet was appointed in his place.
Blake as a student at Oxford had of course held no appointment
within the community, so that his election as Prior made no change in the
roll of its officers. Fascet on the other hand held the two important
positions of Treasurer and Monk-Bailiff as well as being Warden of the
Manors. These offices thus became vacant and in addition other changes
were taking place. William Mane who had held office along with Fascet
both as Treasurer and Warden of the Manors had been appointed
Almoner. For a short time he carried on the duties of Monk-Bailiff in
place of Fascet, but the total burden must have proved too heavy to bear,
and accordingly on October 12th, 1492, John Islip was chosen to hold
with him the joint office of Warden of the Manors and along with
Richard Newbery to succeed him and Fascet as Treasurers. At the same
time Islip took Mane’s place as Monk-Bailiff and Warden of the
Churches.
Islip was only twenty-eight years of age and there were twenty-three
monks senior to him in a community that numbered about fifty. It argues
well alike for his personal popularity and for the esteem in which his
administrative abilities must have been held by both Abbot and Convent
that the choice for such high offices should have fallen upon him.
 Two attractive prospects were opened to him on his accession. As
Monk-Bailiff he had separate apartments where his business could be
transacted and where on occasion he could entertain friends. Accordingly
we find in his diary for Sunday, February 10th, 1493, an entry which
may be translated: I was at the High Mass but I did not sit in the
Refectory because John Butler of Warwickshire and Thomas Candysse
dined with me in the Bailiff’s guest-room.
Still more alluring perhaps to one in whom the life of the cloister can
never have stamped out the love of the open country was the necessary
duty from time to time as Treasurer of making a tour of the various
properties of the monastery. It is not surprising that this should have been
found necessary in his first year of office. Acquaintance with these
properties was certainly to be desired and there can have been no conflict
between the call of duty which would take him again into the ways of
men and the cloistered conscience which would shut him from them.
St. Benedict himself indeed sanctioned occasional absence from the
cloister so long as the Abbot’s leave was first obtained. The novice
vowed faithfulness to the monastery of his profession but not complete
or permanent seclusion within its walls, and if it be urged that such
protracted absence as this of the new Treasurer would never have been
contemplated by St. Benedict it might with equal truth be argued that St.
Benedict could hardly be expected to foresee the acquirement of the
scattered properties which made such absence necessary. In any case the
Benedictine ideal of the monastery was the ideal of the self-contained
family and would not be infringed in spirit at least by the necessary
absence on family business of one member of it.
Accordingly after dinner on Sunday, June 30th, 1493, Islip set out on
a tour which was to last nearly a month. On the first day he rode as far as
Aldenham and held a court there on the Monday morning. Rising
betimes on Tuesday he rode as far as Berkhampstead to mass, dined with
Master John Shorne and went on to Langton for the night, where he held
a court the next day. Thursday was a day of relaxation and he records
that the whole of it was spent in the forest hunting in company with
Master Lanxston and Master Gifford. Langton to Turweston and
Banbury, Banbury to Warwick and Knowle, Coventry, Leicester,
Oakham, Oundle, Huntingdon, so does he proceed, rising early and
covering many miles before hearing his daily mass and breaking his fast.
Offord, Langford, Ashwell, Malden, Feering, Kelvedon, Benfleet,
Romford, such are some further stages of his journey. Only once did he
spend more than one night in the same place, so that the tour if pleasant
was by no means dilatory. He reached home again on July 24th.
He does not record what servants attended him, but the whole cost of
his journey was two hundred and fifty-one marks, an average of ten
marks a day, so that it is probable that such retinue accompanied him as
befitted the dignity of his office and the safety of his person. That some
such protection was necessary in those unsettled times will presently
appear.
For the most part his tour was devoid of trouble incidental to the
business aspect of it. Only at South Benfleet had he reason to suspect
that anything was wrong. His suspicions were evidently corroborated
after his return to Westminster, for on August 11th he returned to South
Benfleet and seized the goods of William Gose who was his “farmer” or
agent for the manor and parsonage there. A careful inventory and
valuation was made of them, and they were reckoned to be worth just
over forty-two pounds. Gose was evidently dismissed from office, for a
little later Islip records the handing over of the stores of the manor to
Thomas Petigrewe.
The dangers of the road have just been hinted at and he was a wise
man who kept to the King’s highway. That Islip had them in mind may
be assumed from a long entry in his diary somewhat previous to his tour.
It was a story which he had heard at the Abbot’s table one Sunday from
Richard Dolonde the Abbot’s guest. A certain priest with three servants
had wandered from the high road and come to Egerston at about eight
o’clock in the evening. When the priest’s groom went into the stable of
the inn to fetch straw for his horses he found beneath the straw two men
lying dead. He came and told his master what he had found, and the
latter called the hostess and told her that he could not stay there that
night. She asked him the cause and said “The supper is prepared, the
meat killed and all things are ready, and now you will not wait, I marvel
strongly.” Then the priest pretended different reasons for his going and at
last told her the true one, saying “I do not dare to stay the night here for
that two men lie dead in your stable.” She answered “This is the truth,
don’t doubt it. It so happened yesterday towards nightfall two knights
were here and their servants fought among themselves so that these two
men were killed, then the others in fear asked my husband and me to
hide their bodies and bury them this night. This we intend to do, so don’t
fear.” The priest believed indeed that what the woman said was true and
so stayed. But about nine o’clock the priest was lying on his bed, being
unwilling to get into it because of his fear, when the landlord came and
knocked at the chamber door and said “Sir, I have brought you apples
and pears and a draught of good wine.” Then the priest replied “I am in
bed, I do not wish to drink to-night.” But the other said “Open the door
that I may speak with you.” Then the priest said “No.” The other replied
“Then I will break it.” So he broke the door and came to the priest with
eleven other men well-armed and said “Seek pardon of your Creator for
you shall die and all your servants,” who when he heard this asked that
he might hear the confessions of his servants. So he heard them and
when confession was done the priest came with his servants and but one
dagger and rushed on the men and killed nine of them. The other three
were taken and hanged, and the wife was burned and so the priest
escaped with his servants, “thanking God to Whom was the honour and
the glory, Amen.”
It may be with such dangers in mind that Islip spent three pence on
arrows for his servant, Robert Seston. The latter received five shillings a
quarter for his wages but was provided with clothing, shoes, and
doubtless food also, at his master’s expense. In addition he might look
forward to a tip of twenty pence on Christmas day as well as on the
anniversaries of Queen Eleanor and King Richard II. As Monk-Bailiff
Islip had his own cook and outfit of kitchen utensils, while two grooms
were in his permanent employment to look after the needs of the seven
or eight horses living in his stables.
It might well be thought that the offices to which Islip had been
appointed in the year 1492 would have provided him with but little
leisure from their exercise to assume new duties. In the year 1496,
however, William Brewode retired from the onerous position of Cellarer
and Islip was elected in his place. The reason for this retirement does not
appear. Brewode was only fifty years of age and there was no suggestion
that he was unfit any longer to hold an office which he had honourably
filled for twelve years and which four years later he was to fill again for
a brief space before becoming Warden of the Lady Chapel. It may be that
Islip was already so clearly marked out for promotion to the highest
places of all that it was thought well for him to have experience of the
widest possible character. This, however, is the merest speculation, and
the reason for the change must be left in obscurity. In the same year Islip
appears in the rôle of Abbot’s Receiver, a position he may have occupied
for the four previous years though no record of it has survived.
 In the two years that followed no incident seems to have occurred of
sufficient importance to call for special mention either in his own life or
that of the monastery until the beginning of the year 1498, when a few
entries recall a story of some historical interest in which Islip was
directly involved.
As far back as the year 1415 Henry V. had directed in his Will that his
body was to be buried in the Abbey Church of St. Peter, Westminster,
among the sepulchres of the Kings on the spot where the relics of the
saints were commonly kept. The beautiful chantry chapel which was
afterwards built in his honour attests the care with which his direction
was carried out.
About the middle of the fifteenth century, before the chapel was
entirely completed, Henry VI. paid many visits to the Abbey church to
see his father’s tomb and select the site for his own, moved thereto by
the same love for St. Edward that had fixed his father’s choice. Many
spots were suggested. Here he could lie, in the grave where Queen
Eleanor’s bones had so long rested. It would be no trouble to move her
tomb. Or there in the Lady Chapel was a suitable place. True the tomb of
his mother Katharine must be moved further westwards, but then the
opportunity could be used to see that it was more “honourably
apparelled.” Or why not move Henry V. a little to one side and so make
room for the son by the father? “Nay, let hym alone, he lieth lyke a
nobyll prince, I wolle not troble hym.” In the same spirit did he reject
one suggestion after another, finally choosing a site on the north side of
the Confessor’s Shrine, and John of Thirsk the Abbey mason was called
upon to mark out the place with his pick.
When, however, some twenty years later Henry died in the Tower his
body was taken first to the Abbey of Chertsey. In consequence of the
story of miracles wrought at his tomb Richard III. caused the coffin to be
removed to Windsor. In the ordinary course of events the story should
end there. But a second chapter begins with the devotion to Henry’s
memory which began to spring up in the country, more especially in the
east and north, within less than ten years from his death. Images of him
were set up in churches and lights burnt before them. New gilds were
founded in his honour and old gilds in one or two instances added his
name to their dedications. He had already been canonised in the popular
imagination before Henry VII. determined to secure that canonisation by
authority and build a shrine-chapel at Windsor where his body already
rested.
 The claims of Windsor were immediately contested by the Abbeys of
Chertsey and Westminster. On February 20th, 1498, the Abbot and
Convent of Westminster petitioned the King pro corpore beati viri
Henrici Sexti. The matter was referred to the Lord Chancellor and the
Privy Council, sitting in the Star Chamber and at Greenwich.
Proceedings began on February 26th and the Abbot of Chertsey was
heard first. He advanced the subtle plea that the royal corpse had been
forcibly exhumed and taken away without the consent of his convent by
Richard who was King in fact but not in right, leaving it to be inferred
that such removal was therefore unlawful. The Dean and Chapter of
Windsor followed. They had been wise enough to take advantage of the
traditional enmity between the Abbey of Westminster and the College of
St. Stephen in the royal palace. They found ready councillors in the Dean
and Canons of the latter foundation and learned probably from them the
form of the plea which it was intended to put forward on behalf of the
Abbey. They first of all contended that so far from the removal being
against the will of the Chertsey monks the Abbot himself had actually
assisted at the exhumation with his own hands. Moreover the King had
chosen his own place of sepulture at Windsor. They added that if no
choice at all could be proved then possession ought to decide the matter.
The Abbot of Westminster was represented by the Prior, George
Fascet, and Islip as Monk-Bailiff. Islip was no stranger to the law, for in
1492 his name appears on the admission register of Gray’s Inn and in
1512 he was regarded as among its most distinguished members.
The Westminster plea was first of all Henry’s own choice. A mass of
testimony was offered from the sworn statements of twelve different
witnesses who had been present at one or other of Henry’s visits to the
Abbey church. This was a strong case in itself as it does not appear that
Windsor had any such evidence to offer. Secondly it was pleaded that
Westminster had for a long time been and still was the burial-place of
Kings, and thirdly that since the Palace of Westminster was bound by
both practical and sentimental ties to the Abbey Henry was to be
considered a parishioner.
The case was adjourned till March 2nd and Islip records the many
incidental expenses to which he had been put for counsel’s opinion,
travelling costs and the like.
Judgment was given on March 5th in favour of Westminster, on the
ground of Henry’s own choice and because it was the burial-place of
kings. Needless to say the fact that the Yorkist Kings Edward IV. and
Richard III. were interred elsewhere was ignored.
It is from this judgment that we must date the first conception of the
new Lady Chapel, commonly known as the Chapel of Henry VII. Its
foundation-stone was not to be laid for four and a half years and in the
meanwhile its primary purpose was to disappear. In the meanwhile also
fresh changes came into the life of the monastery, and the rest of the
story may well take its place in connection with them.
 CHAPTER IV.

ISLIP AS PRIOR.
On May 24th, 1498, Abbot John Estney died. He had ruled the
monastery for twenty-four years and was nearly eighty years of age.
There are indications that he had been for some time failing in health,
and the fact that he had played no part in the action before the Privy
Council in the matter of the burial of Henry VI. suggests that most of his
powers had been by this time delegated to others. He had deserved well
of the community and his loss must have been felt keenly by his
sometime Chaplain, John Islip.
The choice of the Convent fell upon Prior Fascet as Estney’s
successor. He was only about forty-two years old, but it must have been
fairly clear from the first that the choice was made rather in view of his
past services than for any future benefit he could confer upon the
community. The plea of unfitness for the task that he made when the
election was first announced to him was more than merely formal. But a
year later and he was to forsake the independence of the abbatial manors
and occupy the chamber in the monastic infirmary specially set apart for
those for whom there seemed some hope of restoration to health. For
him, however, such restoration was not to be, and in the late summer of
the year 1500 he died. This is, however, to anticipate, and we must go
back to his appointment to the Abbacy two years earlier.
He chose Islip as his successor in the office of Prior. It is at this point
in Islip’s career that one of the small difficulties in the reconstruction of
mediæval monastic life presents itself. There were two occasions in a
monk’s career at Westminster which were deemed worthy of especial
congratulation. The one was the celebration of his first mass after
ordination to the priesthood, following on the conclusion of his
noviciate, and the other when for the first time he sat ad skillam—“by
the bell.” The skilla was the bell which was sounded by the Prior, or in
his absence by the President, in the Refectory for grace to be said, for the
lection to begin or end, or for some other usual signal of the mealtime.
To sit by the bell, therefore, primarily meant to preside at the monastic
meal.
The phrase, however, seems to have been used more loosely of those
who occupied seats at the President’s table and thus to become capable
of a certain ambiguity. It was customary at Westminster for the heads of
the various departments to make a present in money or in kind to a monk
after his first mass and his first sitting ad skillam. If we are to assume the
wider meaning of the latter phrase it is impossible to determine what
were the qualifications which a monk must possess or the period of
probation through which he must pass before his promotion ad skillam.
Islip was not thus advanced until he became Prior, when he must
inevitably so sit; so that the qualification was evidently not that of the
holding of monastic office, however important. Moreover a survey of the
careers of a large number of monks shews that anything from four to
more than thirty years from their profession might elapse before such
promotion came. For example Kirton did not sit ad skillam until he
became Abbot in 1440, thirty-two years after his first mass; while
Thomas Gedney passed to the high table in 1421, within five years of his
profession. Kirton indeed had spent some years of his monastic life at
Oxford and never occupied the position of Prior, yet it would be
expected that on one or other of his visits to Westminster he would be
found to have been sitting at the high table at a far earlier date.
If, however, the narrower meaning of the phrase, that of actually
presiding in the Refectory, may be taken as indicating the occasion upon
which exenia or complimentary gifts were made, the difficulty to some
extent disappears. Actual seniority of profession would then determine
the occasion of the gifts. A relatively young monk such as John Islip
might have sat at the high table long before some accident found him as
the senior monk present in the Refectory, and the same fate might befall
one many years older than himself. Moreover it seems probable from the
fact that two tables were reserved for the senior monks in the Refectory
in addition to the table of the President that the narrower interpretation of
the phrase as used at Westminster is the more correct. This is borne out
also by the fact that the phrase itself is found not only in its ambiguous
form as primo sedente ad skyllam but also as primo presidente ad
skyllam which would seem to admit of no ambiguity at all. It is to be
observed that the phrase is undoubtedly used in the narrower sense at
Westminster at the close of the thirteenth century.
This digression is of some importance to a proper understanding of
Islip’s career. It might be supposed that his early advancement to
important offices had awakened some jealousy in the hearts of his
fellows and had thus delayed his admission to the high table until as
Prior he could no longer be excluded from it. That this was not the case
must be evident from the fact that two years later the brethren themselves
unanimously elected him to the highest office of all.
One further argument may be adduced. It is commonly said that the
Abbot was solely responsible for the appointment of monks to the
different offices of the monastery.[3] In the case of Westminster this
general rule requires some modification. From the time of Abbot Crispin
to Abbot Wenlock, that is to say from A.D. 1085 to 1307, it was
indubitably the custom for the prior and Convent to select two to four
monks from whom the Abbot might make his appointment to certain at
least of the vacant offices. Since in all other respects the agreements
between the Westminster Abbots and their monks continued in force in
the centuries succeeding Abbot Wenlock, there is no reason to suppose
from the lack of evidence that this particular custom changed. It may be
assumed therefore with something more than probability that Islip
represented the selection of the monastery at most stages of his
advancement.
On becoming Prior Islip resigned his offices as Treasurer, Monk-
Bailiff and Warden of the Churches, all of which on occasion would take
him abroad from the cloister. He retained, however, the duties of the
Cellarership, which was a more domestic office.
As Prior indeed he had to do the work which St. Benedict had
designed for the Abbot. He must be in practice what the Abbot was in
theory—the father of the Conventual family. As will appear later the
Abbot, especially of such a monastery as Westminster, was apt to be
drawn into the vortex of public affairs to an extent which left him little
leisure for the essential duties of his position. To some extent also it must
be admitted that the Prior did not share the full life of the brethren. He
had a separate house at the end of the Dark Cloister running parallel to
and south of the Refectory.
Islip himself has left little record of his own tenure of the office, but if
the documents which attest the story of his successor may be taken as
illustrative of the Prior’s life in general, it must be assumed that his share
in the common life was occasional rather than constant, while the
existence of such officials as the Sub-prior and the third or fourth Priors
points to a delegation of duties and a system which may have worked
well in practice but was not consonant with the Benedictine ideal. Those
who are familiar with the course of the development of the collegiate life
which Henry VIII. designed for his new foundation at Westminster in
after-days will have observed the same forces at work in the gradual
isolation of the higher officials from the common table and a somewhat
quicker immersion in outside duties. It can hardly be doubted that such
forces are disruptive in tendency, not necessarily of the body itself, but of
the purpose and ideal for which it was called into being.
The Prior in fact found little difficulty in an occasional absence of
days together from the monastery. A pilgrimage to the Rood of Grace at
Boxley did not require any particular planning or arrangement, while the
record of visitors entertained by “your mastership,” as Prior Mane’s
faithful steward was wont to call him, shews the independent character
of the hospitality which he exercised. Whatever may have been the
frequency of his visits to the cloister Mane would seem seldom to have
dined in the Refectory. He appears indeed as no unfit ruler of the house
but he stands aloof from it none the less, a figure to be regarded by the
younger brethren with more awe than love. There is nothing to shew that
such a life was regarded as other than normal or that his immediate
predecessors had lived in other fashion.
Fascet had been Abbot little more than a fortnight when he signed an
indenture binding himself and the Convent to pay Henry VII. the sum of
five hundred pounds, one hundred of which was to be paid at the
following Christmas and the remainder in two equal portions at the end
of the ensuing years. The King had represented that he was about to be
put to great expense both in obtaining the papal license for and the actual
removal of the body of Henry VI. from Windsor to London. Moreover
the “diuerse other many and grete charges that our said souverain Lord
must bere by the chaunge and alteracion of suche thinges as his Highness
... hadde ordeyned and purposed to have made and done within the said
College of Wyndesore” formed an additional claim upon a Convent
already somewhat put to it to find money for other purposes.
The total sum was, however, paid in the year 1500-1, and John Islip as
the new Sacrist duly recorded it in his roll of account. The entry which
he made was apt to be misleading. Translated it would run thus: “Paid
for the removal of the body of the illustrious King Henry VI. from
Windsor to the monastery of the Blessed Peter, Westminster.” It was
doubtless this entry that subsequently gave rise to the tradition that the
actual removal took place and the body laid in some temporary resting-
place until the new chapel should be built as its shrine. The fact that the
papal brief for the removal was not granted until May 20th, 1504, would
be by itself sufficient to disprove the tradition, but if further proof were
needed it could be found in the Will of Henry VII., which was begun in
1509 and contained the note that the King proposes right shortely to
translate ... the bodie and reliques of our Uncle of blessed memorie King
Henry the VIth.
For some unknown reason the translation was never carried out. It has
been suggested that the large sum of money demanded for canonisation
coupled with Henry’s parsimonious character proved sufficient to stay
the project; but there is no evidence for this conjecture and it seems more
reasonable to suppose that the canonisation was delayed until the new
chapel should be sufficiently ready to receive the body, otherwise
pilgrims would be flocking to Windsor rather than Westminster. Before
the chapel was thus ready Henry VII. died, and it may well be that his
successor had not the same interest in the matter as his father or the same
concern to defend his title to the throne.
One further item of interest may be noted here. The privy purse
expenses of Henry VII. contain payments amounting in all to more than
sixty-eight pounds to Master Esterfelde for making the tomb of Henry
VI. at Windsor, and a further payment to him of ten pounds for the actual
conveyance of this tomb to Westminster. Its ultimate fate, however, was
never recorded.
Whatever might be the final decision of the Convent Abbot Fascet can
have had little doubt as to the proper person to succeed him. In a deed
which is undated but which belongs probably to the year 1499 he
delegated to his Prior, John Islip, his full authority over the monastery,
and Islip became Abbot in fact if not yet in name. His end was not far
off, and in the summer of 1500 he died and was laid to rest in the Chapel
of St. John Baptist.
In due course the royal license was issued to Islip as Prior to proceed
to the election of an Abbot in his place. On October 26th the office of
Abbot was formally declared vacant in the Chapter House. In addition to
Islip some thirty-eight of the monks were present and also Dr. Richard
Rawlyns, a notary, Thomas Chamberlayn, and two representatives of the
law, Doctor Edward Vaughan and Dr. William Haryngton. The election
was fixed to take place on the following day though deliberation might
be prolonged if it seemed desirable. Mass of the Holy Spirit was then
solemnly sung at the high altar and afterwards all assembled in Chapter.
The gathering of the brethren was larger by five than on the previous
day, while Dr. Rawlyns, three legal representatives and a lay witness,
Edmund Dudley, were in attendance. Dr. Rawlyns preached a solemn
discourse on the text: Instead of thy fathers thou shalt have children,
whom thou mayest make princes. “Come, Holy Ghost” was then sung,
with the customary prayers following. The letters patent were read, the
names of the brethren present scrutinised, proclamation made at the
Chapter House door that any who had legal interest in the election should
come in, and then Islip as Prior solemnly warned any who lay under
excommunication, suspension or interdict, or who were for any other
reason disqualified to take part in the election, forthwith to depart.
Dr. Vaughan then formally inquired of the assembled Chapter by what
method they desired the election to go forward. The reply was per viam
Spiritus Sancti, and William Lambard, the senior of the monks present,
nominated John Islip. The choice was immediately acclaimed by all the
brethren without discussion or consultation of any kind.
Lambard at once proceeded to make record of the election. Brother
John Islip, he wrote, was a man careful and discreet, an ornament to the
priesthood in life and habit, wise alike in things spiritual and temporal,
and anxious to preserve and defend the rights of the monastery of his
choice. Procession was then formed to the high altar and Te Deum sung
the while. On reaching the altar Dr. Vaughan made public proclamation
of the election. The brethren then returned to the Chapter House where
the two seniors present, Brothers Lambard and Charyng, were deputed to
carry the formal announcement of his election to the Prior’s lodging
whither the Abbot-elect had retired. Islip proclaimed himself unworthy
of such high office but eventually consented to election multipliciter se
excusans. He recorded his acceptance in this form:
“In the name of God, Amen. I, John Islip, monk of the monastery of
St. Peter Westminster directly attached to the Roman Church, of the
order of St. Benedict, vowed to the order and rule of the same in the said
monastery and canonically elected Abbot thereof, unwilling to resist the
divine will, at the urgent request of the Chapter of the said monastery
and its proctors do consent to my election, in honour of Almighty God,
the Blessed Virgin Mary, St. Peter patron of the said monastery and the
glorious Confessor St. Edward the King.”
The Abbot-elect would seem to have celebrated the occasion by
giving a modest dinner to the Convent if we may judge from the long list
of articles of food purchased by the steward of his new household on that
day. The cost amounted to seventeen shillings and ten pence and the list
included “a potell of swet wyne”—bought perhaps to fill a loving-cup.
Some formalities, however, were necessary before the Abbot-elect
could be installed. The papal confirmation had to be obtained as also
various royal grants of the Abbot’s temporalities. Some of the latter are
dated November 13th and consist of mandates to the Crown escheators
in various counties to deliver the temporalities in their hands.
Matters were sufficiently forward for the installation to be fixed for
November 25th. The three days previous were spent by Islip at the
Abbot’s Manor of Neyte, close to Westminster, where various presents of
food were made to him by his new tenants.
On the morning of the day when my lord was stalled he came from the
Chapel of St. Mary Magdalen at the far end of Tothill Street, then one of
the chief highways of Westminster, with a great number of nobles,
friends and servants and was met in the Conventual cemetery just outside
the west door of the church by five of the senior brethren, Charyng,
Waterden, Langley, Holand and Borough. Waterden handed him the oath
customarily taken by the Abbots to observe “all the rights, statutes and
laudable constitutions and customs of the monastery.” He first read it
through in a low tone and then recited it in a loud and clear voice. Then
there came to him the Sub-prior and the rest of the monks with book,
cross and pastoral staff. He knelt and kissed the book and so was led in
procession into the church where the installation was duly performed. He
subsequently gave a banquet at which probably the whole Convent was
entertained, its cost amounting to no less than £4 13s. 7d.
So he entered on his new dignities. He was but thirty-six years old
and there were no less than sixteen of the brethren who were his seniors
in point of profession. Twenty years had seen him pass from the country-
bred novice to the high position of a mitred Abbot at the opening of a
century destined to bring to the Church changes greater than any that had
happened to it since St. Augustine first landed on the shores of Kent.
 CHAPTER V.

ISLIP AS ABBOT.
Following on his installation as Abbot, Islip was the recipient of
various presents in money from the obedientiaries of the Abbey as well
as of many in kind from friends outside.
The first month of office was spent quietly at Cheynygates and the
earliest record of a visit abroad is contained in his steward’s note that
“this yere my lorde Abbot, the Prior, the monk bayly, and all the Convent
kepe ther Crystemasse wt. my seyd lord Abbott at his maner of Neyte.”
The entertainment was of the most lavish character, in striking contrast
to the relative frugality of the Abbot’s ordinary household expenses. Two
oxen at 13s. 4d. each, seventeen sheep at 1s. 6d. each, nine pigs at 2s.
each, twenty-seven geese, twenty-three capons,—such were some of the
purchases, while what may be called the bill for dessert came to £2 6s.
8d., the whole amounting to more than eight pounds.
For a time the new Abbot found leisure to audit his household
accounts and append his signature with its accustomed rubrica thereto,
but he did not long continue the practice, perhaps because he found that
he was being honestly served and more important matters were to hand.
His steward records that the second Christmas was spent at Hendon “and
maister prior and maister monk Bayly to gether at maister prior’s place.”
The latter facts were no business of his, but we are glad of his gossiping
pen and shall have occasion to quote him again.
It is important to notice an innovation in the monastic system which
Islip continued but which was initiated by Estney. The story of the
completion of the building of the nave will be told later, so that it need
not be dwelt on now. In his anxiety for this work Estney on becoming
Abbot in 1474 retained in his hands the two offices of Sacrist and
Warden of the New Work, as bearing directly on the building operations.
This retention was continued by Fascet and Islip in turn. All of them of
course employed deputies to assist them but maintained control of the
funds of the two offices.
Estney was the first Abbot to hold an office in the monastery, and it
must argue well for his personal influence or popularity that he was
allowed to do so. In an earlier century such action would have been
strongly resented, so clearly defined were the relative positions and
functions of ruler and ruled.
It is a matter of no little difficulty to estimate the meaning and
importance of such an innovation. It is possible to read into it a symptom
of the declining vigour of monastic life, more especially in view of the
fact that in the early sixteenth century the tendency was to unite various
offices in one holder and so for many monks never to hold office at all.
But it does not seem necessary to invest Estney’s action with any such
indication of decay in strength on the part of those over whom he ruled.
The work of rebuilding the nave was the greatest enterprise of its kind
which had ever been undertaken by the Abbot and Convent, and it might
well be considered a sign of common sense that the two offices which
were especially ad hoc should have been allowed by the Convent to be
retained by the chief director and inspirer of the task in hand. Delay and
friction may have occurred in the previous years when there was divided
responsibility. But when all is said it must be admitted that the true
significance of the innovation has not been adequately determined. For
the purposes of the present story, however, there is this advantage that
the rolls of the retained offices provide much additional material for
noting Islip’s personal activities.
At the time of Islip’s accession the financial management of the
monastery must have given occasion for anxious thought. The payment
of royal subsidies was shared between the incomes of the different
offices and weighed heavily upon all, amounting roughly as it generally
did to a five per cent. tax upon diminishing receipts. For four years tithes
had decreased in value and in each of them the Sacrist’s roll had shewn a
deficit which in Islip’s first year had fortunately to some extent been
compensated for by an increase in the rents from Westminster property.
An annual payment of fifty shillings from the Royal Exchequer for the
renewal of candles about the tomb of Edward I.—a payment which had
been made for centuries—was discontinued in 1497, and not for
seventeen years did Islip secure its revival and then only for a time.
Offerings at the different altars which in 1496 had amounted to more
than forty-eight pounds had in 1500 shrunk to less than thirty-six.
Until the year 1509 Islip was unable to shew any credit balance in the
Sacrist’s account, though he gradually reduced the deficit. In that year,
however, occasions of special profit arose. The offerings at the burial of
Henry VII. came to more than one hundred and forty-eight pounds, those
at the funeral of the lady Margaret his mother to twenty-two, and the
oblations at the High Altar at the subsequent coronation of Henry VIII.
and Katharine of Arragon to forty-seven.
Islip, however, in the earlier years of his abbacy did not regard the
need for rigid economy as any excuse for the restriction of services. On
the other hand he would seem to have multiplied the number of masses
said in the church, for while in his first year nineteen thousand “breads”
were purchased for this purpose no less than twenty-nine thousand were
required in the second. In 1504 considerable outlay was made on the
repair of vestments, lamps and other ornaments of the church, and there
is in these years every evidence that there was no slackening at least of
the external observances. Small items of expenditure have their interest.
Henry VII. would seem to have had a private apartment in the church,
for in 1491 keys had been bought for his seat and closet therein, while in
1504 there is a payment of four pence for “teynterhokys and cordes for
the travers of the lord king in the church,” and a further expenditure of
two pence for rosemary bought for the King.
The Abbey church has been the scene of many a service of striking
splendour in the course of its long history but few of them can have
rivalled in curious impressiveness that which took place in November of
the year 1515. Wolsey had attained the goal of his immediate though not
of his ultimate desires, and on the fifteenth of the month his cardinal’s
hat was brought in solemn procession through London to the Abbey
church, where Islip and eight other Abbots received it and solemnly laid
it upon the High Altar. On Sunday the 18th Wolsey, attended by nobles
and gentlemen, came from York Place to the church, where mass was
solemnly sung by the Archbishop of Canterbury. There were present the
Archbishops of Armagh and Dublin, the Bishops of Lincoln, Exeter,
Winchester, Ely, Durham, Norwich and Llandaff, beside the Abbots of
Westminster, St. Albans, Bury, Glastonbury, Reading, Gloucester,
Winchcombe, Tewkesbury, and the Prior of Coventry. The sermon was
preached by Colet, Dean of St. Paul’s, who is recorded to have said that
“a cardinal represents the order of seraphim which continually burneth in
the love of the glorious Trinity, and for these considerations a cardinal is
apparelled only in red, which colour only betokeneth nobleness”—surely
adulation enough even for Wolsey’s ambitious spirit! The final prayers
and benediction were pronounced by the Archbishop of Canterbury over
Wolsey’s prostrate form as “he lay grovelling” before the High Altar, and
at last the hat was placed on his head. It is interesting for those
acquainted with Abbey traditions to note that in the recessional the cross
was carried before the new cardinal though he was not yet a papal legate,
while no such distinction was accorded to the Archbishop of Canterbury.
The Abbey of Westminster was proud of its exemption from all but
papal jurisdiction. No bishops made there any disciplinary visitations.
Wolsey became legate in 1518 and Polydore Vergil records that he made
a visitation of the Abbey in that year. Of this the Abbey records shew no
trace though notice was given of such visitation by Wolsey and
Campeggio.
One document (a copy) which still survives and refers to that year
belongs probably to a later occasion. It is a roll on which appears as title
A Supplicacon of a monk of Westm’ to ye beshop of Rome. Its preamble
begins:—“Pitteously complaynyth unto your most holly ffatherhed, well
of all remedy, hed and superyor of the spirytuall powr, your pour
suppliant and orator.” The monk remains anonymous, but his complaint
is that in 1518 when Islip was Abbot and William Mane Prior it fortuned
the said Prior to be robbed and spoiled of certain goods by a servant and
kinsman of his own, “so being forth at a place of his called Belsaes.”
When tidings was brought to Mane “he sayd strayth that it was my arte
and dede and put it holy to me that I had Robbed hym of lij lib. of plate
and so incontynet went unto the abbot then lyeng at Hendon ... uppon the
which I was ffet owt of my chamber by Dane John Chorysshe then
beyng his chapelayn which brougt me unto the prior, which prior
commandyd me unto ward in a sertayn chamber where I dyd contynue
withowte bed ... untyll the commnyg hom of the Abbot, at whose
commyng I was examynd and then the prior had nothyng to say unto me
but askyd me wher I had the iiij lib. that I did hend unto marshall of
Barmysay wher as this I declaryd me to have it by the deth of my father
... the prior comayndyd me ayenn unto the pryson untyll he had made
dew prove thereof and in the meane season thabbot did return unto
Hendon and at his commyng ayenn whan the trowgh began to Appere
they beyng asshamed of the sayd slander the abbot cam unto me and
sayd Brother A.B. wyll you put this matter unto my handis and I
promyse yew I shall se yow have a great mense made, And forbycause I
was under his obbedience I was content so to do but as yet I had never
nothyng but toke by that means a great and greavous sykenesse, at which
tym of sycknesse it cam unto my lot to syng the chapter masse, but I
beyng dyseasyd durst not nor could not take it uppon me but yet wt.
compulcion he cawsyd me to do it, so it fortuned the sayd day at masse
at the Gospell tyme by the reason of that sycnesse so takyn to be so
sycke that I sownyd at the Auter where at they were fayn to cut my
gyrdell to revyue me, so that after masse as sone as I cam in to the
revestery I was compelled to vomyt....
“ ... And after that toke a sycnesse which held me iiij yeres. And
where as ther is a howse cawlyd the farmary to kepe syck men in to the
which ther is a lowyd I lib, by the yere to be put to that use wher as every
oon beyng sycke iij d. by the day wt. sertyn fagottis and other thyngis.
your sayd suppliant had nether but lay at his owne cost utterly to his
undoyng and to the poverysshement of his ffriendis.... But uppon a
malyciouse mynd the pryor that now is informyd the abbot so that he
sayd openly at the chapeter that I was a gret dysoymaler and was no
more syck than his horse yet he discharged me there. And so after
incontenent wt. sutche small comfortis as I had and purchased of my
ffrendis I did send for mr. Docter yarkeley doctr. barlet Doctr. ffreman mr.
Grene mr. Pawle which opynly did prove me to be infected with dyvers
sycknesse whereof the lest were able to kyll a Ryht strong man, the Abot
heryng of thys comanydy me to ly in the subchamber and there I lay iij
quarteris of a yere and vj weekis withowt anny succoure of the howse ...
but had utterly peryeshed but for my ffrendis....”
The suppliant goes on to ask that bulls may be issued commanding
the monastery on pain of excommunication to give him the first benefice
that shall happen to be vacant so that it be of the value of twenty pounds
with his portion, monk’s pension, stall in choir and voice in Chapter on a
day of election.
It is unfortunate that the name of the author of this realistic petition
cannot be recovered, but the petition itself alone survives. We have only
one side of the case and it may have been true that he was no more sick
than the Abbot’s horse! It may be that this petition was presented in 1525
when Wolsey signified his intention of holding a visitation of the Abbey.
Islip wrote a reply to the cardinal promising to be present with all his
monks. He admits the need of such visitations, for abbots, abbesses, and
priors have become lax in their mode of life and observance of rule, and
lukewarm in their examples; while regulars who ought to be models to
the laity in life, in morals and good works, lead lives little corresponding
thereto, to the great scandal of many. The letter is a disinterested
comment on the monasticism of the day but it would be foolish to draw
any sweeping conclusion from it. Islip had conducted such visitations
himself, and in 1516 had seen fit to suspend a Prior of Malvern. No
records of the result of Wolsey’s visit seem to remain beyond its cost,
and doubtless he found little upon which to comment.
 The Benedictine custom of sending certain of their monks to Oxford
has already been mentioned. Towards the close of the thirteenth century
Gloucester College had been established there, to which a few years later
Westminster students began to be admitted. Among those in residence
there in 1522 was Thomas Barton, already a Doctor of Divinity and
about to become Prior of the students of the college. An interesting
document survives in his handwriting which may be allowed to speak for
itself:
“This byll testyfythe yt we V scholars wth other V wth us of ye
brethrens of Gloster colege hathe expendyd yn ye observaunce of holy
sent Edwardis or patronys servisse kept at yslipe yn hys chappell & of ye
dyryge & massys kept yr yn ye paryshe churche for ye sowlys of ye
parentis of or most worshypfull spirituall father yn god ye abotte of
Wesminster the summe of xs the yere of or lord a mcccccxxijti the xvth
day next after mykyl day

by me rudely wryt
Dan Thomas Barton
monk of Wesmynster”

Immediately upon Barton’s appointment as Prior of the students Islip

made him a present of over four pounds, a typical instance both of his
personal generosity and of the interest which he shewed in the absent
sons of his house.
In Islip’s time the monastery was represented also at Cambridge at the
hostel called Buckingham College, which was founded in 1428 for
Benedictine students drawn from monasteries in the eastern counties.
The connection of Westminster with Cambridge began in practice in
1499, just about the time when Islip as Prior received the delegation of
Abbot Fascet’s powers. His interest in the Cambridge students is evident
from a letter which he wrote about the year 1524 to John Thaxted, Abbot
of Walden, calling his attention to the condition of their college which
was without a rector, and expressing a wish that John Hastley, a student
from Selby Abbey, might have leave to pursue his legal studies at St.
Nicholas’ Inn. The generosity of the Lady Margaret to the university was
probably not without its influence in strengthening the connection with
Westminster.
Islip, like many of his predecessors, had some unfortunate
experiences in connection with the Gatehouse prison, for the security of
which he was personally responsible. In 1506 one John Calcote,
Gentleman of London, who was in his charge on various accusations of
felony, managed to escape from custody, and Islip was accordingly fined.
Two years later George Wolmer, Yeoman of Lingfield, fled for sanctuary
to St. Mary Overy, Southwark. He was outlawed, but later on was
arrested in England. He pleaded benefit of clergy and was handed over to
Islip’s care. On his subsequent escape a Middlesex jury found a charge
of negligent custody duly proved.
Yet the keeping of the gaol in spite of these and other instances of
resultant trouble would seem to have been profitable, for Islip was
diligent in defending not only the rights of sanctuary but also the
privileges of receiving accused folk whether clerical or lay arrested
within his jurisdiction, a diligence observable in subsequent centuries in
those who took his place, though not his office. He was jealous too of his
position as Abbot of Westminster, with all that that high office involved.
For example, it chanced that he was present at a Chapter of the Prior and
Convent of Greater Malvern in 1529, perhaps on a visitation, and he took
the opportunity of professing certain of their novices, but he was careful
to make it understood that he was in no way detracting from the old
arrangement by which the Malvern monks must make their profession at
Westminster.
The various inventories of the time and the records of the
Augmentation Office and Exchequer bear testimony to his generous gifts
of vestments and ornaments to the Abbey church. The elaboration of his
unfinished mortuary roll witnesses to the esteem in which his Convent
held him. He was the last of the great Abbots of Westminster, a not
ignoble line, and it may confidently be asserted that his rule will bear
comparison with that of any of his predecessors.
It is natural to scan the Abbey records of his time for signs of the
approaching cataclysm and equally natural perhaps to exaggerate the
significance of their presence or absence. Among these records the signs
are few. As long as Islip lived one might suppose from them that
monastic life at Westminster eight years before the dissolution of the
monastery was pursuing the same even and profitable course that it had
pursued half a century earlier when he first entered the monastery, and
indeed that in some respects it was shewing even greater vigour. The
enthusiasm for the internal work of the rebuilding of the nave and the
external stimulus of the foundation of Henry VII. do not point to a
community anticipating any breaking of its bonds.
 Yet it must be confessed that the materials for an accurate and well-
considered judgment are lacking. If a verdict must be passed on the
evidence which exists it would be in favour of the supposition just
mentioned. At the same time it must not be supposed that the community
was blind as to the general trend of the times or oblivious to the
possibilities that awaited it.
Two things stand out in the last year of Islip’s life as pointing to the
fact that the Convent was facing forces too strong for it. In 1531 it was
paying an annual bribe to Thomas Cromwell, a payment which was
euphemistically called “a fee granted to him for the term of his natural
life,” the Sacrist’s share of which was £6 13s. 4d. The second indication
lies in the unequal bargain made by Islip with the King in the exchange
of property. After Wolsey’s fall the King had annexed York Place,
ignoring the fact that it was the property of the northern archbishopric
and not that of Wolsey himself. The larger portion of the residential part
of the Palace of Westminster had been destroyed by fire in 1512 and the
King proposed enormous extensions to Whitehall, as his new palace was
now to be called. For these he must acquire the houses on both sides of
the street to the north and south of the existing buildings. Most of these
houses belonged to the Abbey and it can be easily imagined that Islip
would be unable to withhold his assent to the scheme. He was employed
along with Thomas Cromwell to pay compensation to evicted tenants,
and in this way a sum of more than eleven hundred pounds was
disbursed. But the Convent itself received no adequate compensation.
Henry indeed gave it the Priory of Poughley in Berkshire, one of the
smaller houses which Wolsey had dissolved. Poughley had been founded
about 1160 by Ralph de Chaddleworth as a house for Austin Canons and
in theory its revenues amounted to about seventy pounds. In actual
practice the Abbey were worse off by some fifteen pounds a year.
It remains only to note one or two instances of Islip’s activities. When
the ancient college of St. Martin-le-Grand in London came into the
possession of the Abbey at the beginning of the sixteenth century Islip
drew up new statutes for it, and the records of his dealing with this
foundation shew evidence of a shrewd business mind. From time to time
his name occurs in connection with the General Council of Benedictines
of which he was President in 1527. On this occasion he issued a
commission to William, Abbot of Gloucester, to hold a visitation of the
Abbey of Malmesbury where there had been a rebellion of the members
of the house against their Abbot. Towards the end of his life he was one
of the royal chaplains, but the record of his appointment does not appear.
 Islip died on Sunday, May 12th, 1532, at his manor house of Neyte,
and was buried four days later in the centre of his own chapel. So great
was the public interest in his funeral that its train is said to have stretched
from Neyte to Tothill Street. The Abbot of Bury officiated at the
interment and pontificated at the mass of requiem on the day following,
the sermon being preached by the Vicar of Croydon. The references to
Islip’s work as a builder which Hacket makes in his life of Bishop
Williams may be very inaccurate, but there is no reason to question his
estimate of Islip’s character as “a devout servant of Christ and of a
wakeful conscience.” The last great Abbot of Westminster, it may be
truly said of him that he was felix opportunitate mortis. His latter days
may well have been full of anxiety, but he did not live to see the storm
break or to suffer in the vast upheavals which were so soon to follow and
which assuredly would have broken his heart. But three days after his
death the clergy in Convocation were forced to consent that they would
neither enact nor enforce new canons without the royal initiative and
assent. On the very day of his burial Sir Thomas More handed back the
Great Seal to the King. Islip’s funeral was “the funeral of the Middle
Ages.”
 CHAPTER VI.

ISLIP IN PUBLIC LIFE.

The personality of the Abbot of Westminster can seldom have been a
matter of indifference to the reigning Sovereign. The mere proximity of
Court and monastery would alone be sufficient to ensure some degree of
friendship or provoke some measure of antagonism, and instances are
not wanting of both. But when it is remembered that the Abbey church
was the place of burial of many and the place of coronation of all the
Kings; that it contained the saintly relics of one and owed its very
structure to another, it is not surprising that at times Abbot and King
should be brought together in intimate contact.
When Islip first became Abbot every circumstance combined to bring
such contact about. Henry VII. was half ready with the plans for his new
chapel and Islip’s enthusiasm as a builder must already have been
obvious. It may be supposed that Islip had already attracted the royal
notice by his share in the matter of the proposed translation of Henry VI.,
and the King’s assent to his election would seem to have been given
readily enough if we may judge by the relative lack of delay in issuing
the royal writs that dealt with the Abbot’s temporalities.
One small incident suggests that the new Abbot soon became on
intimate terms with the King. Islip’s cook had evidently a reputation for
the excellence of his marrowbone puddings, for presents of such to the
Lord Chamberlain and others of his friends were not infrequent. Before
Islip had been Abbot for six months we find in his household accounts
the record of the purchase of “ij marybons for ij podyngis for the Kyng.”
The cost was only two pence, but in skilled hands the value was
evidently more. The present of a buck from one to the other would be a
matter of no surprise, but there is a certain intimacy, indefinable perhaps
but none the less real, implied in so trivial a gift as that of a marrowbone
pudding.
A few weeks later the Abbot’s steward notes that “the Kingis grace
dyned at Cheynygate.” The cost of the entertainment was only 17s. 4d.
and the fare provided was by no means elaborate. It was on a Friday so
no meat was served, and the only purchases unusual to the Abbot’s
accounts were wine and strawberries which together cost 3s. 8d., a barrel
of ale for 2s. and a “potell of wyne for to Sowse ffysche wt.” for 4d. The
endowment of the King’s new chapel and the services to be performed in
it when finished would have been a topic of interest to both and in itself
have provided sufficient matter for conversation. A further instance of
friendly relations may be found in the royal presents to Islip of two tuns
of wine yearly which began in the year 1501.
Islip’s first entry into public life, so far as can be discovered, must
date from his appointment in 1504 as treasurer of the hospital of the
Savoy, then about to be rebuilt by Henry VII. It does not appear that the
Abbot had any particular share in the work beyond the actual
guardianship of the funds. The money came to him in sealed bags which
were probably deposited in the undercroft of the Chapter House. He
might not deliver them over without the royal warrant in Henry’s lifetime
or an order signed by seven at least of Henry’s executors after his death.
In 1512 he had as much as ten thousand pounds in his keeping, the last
instalment of which he paid over late in the year 1515 when his
connection with the hospital came apparently to an end.
The trust which Henry VII. placed in him was continued by his
successor, and in September, 1513, Islip appears as a member of the
Privy Council of Henry VIII. Thomas Wolsey had been appointed to the
Council two years before. The Abbot and the future Cardinal must,
however, have been acquainted at an earlier date, for in 1505 Wolsey had
been appointed a chaplain to Henry VII. In 1507 the Abbot and Convent
had granted to Sir Richard Empson the parsonage and adjoining gardens
of St. Bride’s, Fleet Street, and when Empson fell the grant was given to
Wolsey, who thus became a tenant of the Abbey. Moreover both Islip and
Wolsey were among the personal friends of Sir Reginald Bray, a
favoured adviser of Henry VII.
Reference has been made elsewhere to Islip’s legal training. This was
doubtless responsible for his appointment in 1510 as a trier of petitions
of England, Ireland, Wales and Scotland, an office which he continued to
fill in the years that followed. In 1519 Wolsey deputed him along with
others to hear the causes of poor men depending in the Star Chamber,
while in 1512 and subsequent years his name appears on the
Commission of Peace for the County of Middlesex.
Among the minor activities of these years may be included Islip’s
work in 1524 as a Collector for Middlesex on behalf of the loan for the
war with France, and in 1526 as a Commissioner of Sewers from East
Greenwich to Gravesend, work in which he was associated among others
with Sir Thomas More and Lord Cobham. It is interesting to note in the
Navy List for 1513 the Abbot of Westminster as part owner of the ship
Kateryn Fortileza, doubtless one of that gallant squadron which swept
the Channel under Sir Edmund Howard and blockaded the port of Brest.
Little record remains of any activity Islip may have displayed in
Parliament. As a mitred abbot he was summoned to the assembly which
met early in 1515, and there is some evidence to shew that in 1523 he
was not a silent member, but his record in this connection is to be sought
in the work of Parliament in general rather than in individual effort.
Elusive references to Islip in public documents are not infrequent in
the second decade of the sixteenth century, but it is not easy to place
them in their historical setting. For instance we find that he had evidently
made a loan of some magnitude to his fellow Privy Councillor, the Earl
of Shrewsbury, but the purpose of the loan cannot be discovered and we
note only the difficulty which Shrewsbury had in making repayment and
the not unusual mode of behaviour on the part of the defaulting debtor of
sending a present of venison in place of an instalment of the debt.
At this time Islip would seem to have stood just on the outer fringe of
public affairs. He dined with Wolsey in 1516 to meet the ambassadors
from Scotland, and in the summer of 1520, when the mission from
France was being shewn the sights of London, he “enterteigned” the
three gentlemen that composed it with “right goodly chere,” for among
those sights was the King’s new chapel at Westminster, not to mention
the Hospital of the Savoy. So, too, he visited the Princess Mary at
Richmond and is able to report with the rest of the Privy Council that she
“is right merry and in prosperous health and state, daily exercising
herself in virtuous pastimes.” The visit was followed by gifts of
puddings, for the bringing of which the Abbot’s servants were duly
tipped by the Princess. Again, on the occasion of the important visit of
the Emperor Charles V. to England in May, 1522, Islip was summoned
along with his brethren of Bury, Canterbury and Bermondsey, to attend
Wolsey at Dover to meet him, but this must not be interpreted to imply
that Islip had any share in the important matters that were to hand. It
would be but a compliment to his orthodox majesty to be met by
representative Churchmen and to the Churchmen themselves to be asked
to meet him.
Among the problems of the earlier Tudor period was one of interest at
the present time. There are no unimpeachable statistics as to the
proportion of English land which was held by the Church but that
proportion was undoubtedly large. Many of the monasteries were
landlords on a large scale and yet were suffering the pinch of severe
poverty. The land was becoming denuded of tenants and rapidly passing
from the plough to pasture. Increasing demands from the royal
exchequer upon monastic houses aggravated the evil and it has been well
said that “debt with no chance of redemption weighed heavily upon all.”
It was a problem that Islip could view both with personal knowledge
and official interest. It was a natural but at the same time an anomalous
appointment which placed Islip in 1516 on a Commission among whose
terms of reference were inquiries as to what towns, hamlets, houses and
buildings had been destroyed since 1489; what and how much land in
cultivation in that year had since been converted into pasture; what
number of parks had since been inclosed, and what land had been added
to existing parks. Islip was concerned in this inquiry with Middlesex
only, but that county included his own Manor of Hendon as well as other
portions of the abbatial property, not to mention manors such as Ashford
which belonged to his Convent.
In 1522 was levied the first of a series of loans designed to defray the
costs of ineffective foreign wars and Islip was associated with Sir
Andrew Wyndsore and Thomas Docwra, the Prior of the Order of St.
John, as a Commissioner for Middlesex. Theirs was the unpopular task
of making a list of all the residents in the county who possessed a yearly
income of twenty pounds in goods or land, of ascertaining the total value
of their property and assessing the tax due from them by way of loan.
But if Islip had thus to deal with others he did not escape himself. His
own contribution was one thousand pounds, equalling that of the
Archbishop of Canterbury, a sum which by now he could ill afford. At
the same time he had to look forward to the payment of his share of an
annual grant levied upon the whole spirituality of the kingdom for the
King’s expenses in France.
In 1525 Islip was sent by Wolsey to inquire into the affairs of the
Abbey of Glastonbury. Abbot Richard Beere had died and considerable
delay had occurred in electing his successor. Finally the forty-seven
monks decided to remit the appointment to Wolsey who selected Richard
Whiting, then Chamberlain of the Abbey, for the vacant office, doubtless
on Islip’s recommendation. It was perhaps well that Islip did not live to
see the tragic fate that was to overtake the new Abbot.
Another side of Islip’s later life is seen in his occasional presence at
the trial of those accused of holding or promulgating heretical doctrine. It
is easy to-day to enlarge upon the bigotry and intolerance of the judges at
such trials, and to make much of the unreliable stories of men such as
Foxe. It is less easy but it is imperative for a proper understanding to
make the necessary effort of imagination and place oneself in the
position of men faced with the spread of opinions which were subversive
of all that they believed true and all that they held dear, opinions which
they thought to be destructive of a social order which they had long
prized. It is foolish to defend them on the ground that they but found
men guilty or not guilty of offences for which the civil and not the
ecclesiastical arm awarded the punishment. They would have scorned
such a plea in their own defence. It is better to try to understand the point
of view which could place men of such gentle character as Thomas More
in the position of apparent persecutors. The old order was changing, and
the phenomena which accompany such changes, whether ecclesiastical
or social, are apt to be the same in every age though they find expression
in different modes of action. It is the form of expression which
characterises the age rather than the phenomena which produce it.
Islip’s first connection with such matters appears to have been in
1526, when Wolsey appointed him to search for heretics among the
Hanseatic merchants in London. The search was apparently successful,
for he presided together with the Bishop of Bath and Wells at the trial of
one Hans Ellerdope, the main accusation against whom was the
possession of one of Luther’s prohibited treatises. The trial took place
probably in the Chapter House of the Abbey, for the Prior, the
Archdeacon, and another monk were all present. Ellerdope protested that
he could neither speak nor understand Latin. He had not therefore read a
single page of the book but had refrained from burning it because it was
not his own property. He had found it in the chamber of one of his
master’s agents on whose death he had taken possession of it. The issue
of the trial does not appear but it seems probable that Ellerdope was
acquitted.
In 1527 the Chapter House was definitely the scene of a trial. On this
occasion Wolsey, attended by a long array of bishops, lawyers and
others, presided there at the trial of one Thomas Bilney for heretical
pronouncements. Bilney is only of interest as being, according to Foxe,
“a Cambridge man and the first Framer of that University in the
knowledge of Christ.” More interesting would it be to have heard the talk
of the monastery upon the trial which was taking place in its very centre.
In the last two years of his life Islip was connected with two more
such trials, both of which were held in the Consistory Court in St. Paul’s
Cathedral and were presided over by the Bishop of London. One of these
was that of Richard Bayfield, a renegade monk of Bury, against whom
thirteen articles of offence were alleged. The more important items in the
indictment were the importation of the works of Luther and of divers
other heretics, and the holding of opinions contrary to Holy Church. The
Abbots of Westminster and Waltham together with certain of the nobility
and others assisted the Bishop at the trial. Bayfield was found guilty and
handed over to the Mayor and Sheriffs of London. In due course he
suffered at the stake. The second trial was that of a leather-seller, John
Tewkesbury, who came to the same end, but in this case Islip seems only
to have been present at the first hearing.
But if this aspect of Islip’s public life is little calculated to attract the
sympathies of more tolerant times still less perhaps is the part which he
played in the matter of the King’s divorce. It was but a minor part, but
there can be little doubt as to Islip’s views in the case. No sadder fate fell
to any woman in English history than came to Katharine of Arragon. Yet
sympathy is apt to outrun judgment, and the easily formed verdict of all
but the student dwells on the pathos of her story, makes much of the
King’s sensual inclinations, and is entirely uninterested in and impatient
of the problems and niceties of ecclesiastical law.
To attempt some defence of Islip’s action is not necessarily to attempt
the same for Henry, though the efforts of the one were enlisted in the
service of the other. To a Churchman such as Islip, though not to the
Statesman such as Wolsey, there was but one point at issue in the matter
and that was the legality of the original dispensation for the marriage
which Pope Julius II. had granted. This can hardly be too strongly
emphasised if strict justice is to be done to men such as he was. In this
connection it is to be noted that eight of the foreign universities to whom
the question was submitted and as to the general impartiality of whose
judgment there can be little question decided that the Pope’s dispensation
was null and void. The verdicts of the English universities in Henry’s
favour and those of the Spanish against him may be neglected as not
uninfluenced by questions of expediency, but it is impossible to ignore
the importance of the decision of the others.
Islip was present on two famous occasions in the year 1529: on May
31st, when the papal commission was presented to Cardinals Wolsey and
Campeggio by the Bishop of Lincoln and a citation issued for the King
and Queen to appear before their Court, and on June 18th, when the King
appeared by proxies and Katharine attended in person to protest against
the Cardinal’s jurisdiction. In the furtherance of the King’s suit Islip was
employed with others to search for documents among the royal papers
and to report on others in the possession of Garter King of Arms.
On July 13th, 1530, the Lords Spiritual and Temporal sent a petition
to Clement VII. praying him to grant the divorce “if it can be granted
with justice.” This petition was signed by both Archbishops, by four
Bishops and by twenty-two Abbots of whom Islip was one. The Pope’s
difficulties in the matter are well known and the story of Islip’s
connection with it may be concluded with the mention of the letter which
the King wrote on July 10th, 1531, telling Benet to suggest to the Pope
that if he were afraid of the Emperor Charles, as he undoubtedly was, the
Archbishop of Canterbury might be appointed to judge of the matter.
With the Archbishop might be associated the Abbot of Winchcombe or
the Abbot of Westminster, “a good old father.” This suggestion of course
came to nothing and Islip did not live to see the matter finally
determined.
Some time, however, before Henry’s letter Wolsey had died. Before
his fall it had seemed for a moment that others would be involved with
him among whom was Islip. In one of the indictments of Wolsey under
the Statute of Præmunire, an undated copy of which is in the archives of
the Abbey, Islip was also charged. After setting forth the accusations
against Wolsey the document may be translated somewhat thus:—
“Nevertheless John, Abbot of the monastery of St. Peter, Westminster,
little weighing the said statute, verily indeed setting it at naught,
scheming and seeking after the said Cardinal in all his evil deeds, joined
himself to him in a fuller and more extravagant use of his said powers
and pretended legatine authority, and took him as his guide and almost as
his tutor and gradually undermined the laws of this realm and at last
almost extinguished the same, with the result that the aforesaid Cardinal
bore himself the more loftily and insolently in his legatine state and
dignity. Upon a day at Westminster the said Abbot submitted himself to
the Cardinal and accepted and approved the several legatine faculties and
professed obedience to the same Cardinal and promised it by a binding
oath. And also he promised him the annates of his exempt monastery
right up to the Feast of the Annunciation, 20 Henr. VIII., and caused him
to be paid in full at Westminster. And so the said Abbot abetted the said
Cardinal in his contempt of the King....”
Præmunire was a convenient weapon in the King’s hands and he was
graciously pleased to pardon Islip with various others against whom