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in England, an assertion which seems to have been hasty and incorrect. He stayed abroad for three years, and so well-nigh threw away the victory he had gained, for while he was absent Alchfrith lost his kingdom, and the rivalry between the two divisions of Northumbria found expression in a revulsion of feeling in ecclesiastical matters. When he came back he found that Aidan’s disciple, Ceadda (St. Chad), the brother of Cedd, who had adopted the Roman customs, had been appointed bishop in his place. He retired to Ripon, acted as bishop in other parts, and helped forward the introduction of Roman monasticism into monasteries that had hitherto followed the Columban model.

CHAPTER II.

       Table of Contents

      ORGANIZATION.

      ARCHBISHOP THEODORE—HIS WORK IN ORGANIZATION—NEW DIOCESES—WILFRITH’S APPEALS TO ROME—LITERARY GREATNESS OF NORTHUMBRIA—PARISHES—TITHES—THE CHURCH IN WESSEX—A THIRD ARCHBISHOPRIC—THE CHURCH IN RELATION TO THE STATE—TO ROME—TO WESTERN CHRISTENDOM.

      Archbishop Theodore, 668–690.

      Among the victims of the plague of 664 was Archbishop Deusdedit, the first English successor of Augustin. After the see of Canterbury had lain vacant for three years, Oswiu, who held a kind of supremacy in England, and Ecgberht of Kent joined in writing to Pope Vitalian, asking him to consecrate a Kentish priest named Wighard as archbishop. Wighard died of the plague at Rome before he was consecrated, and the Pope wrote to the kings that, agreeably to their request, he was looking for a fit man to be consecrated. As, however, the kings had made no such request, and had simply asked him to consecrate the man whom they and the English Church had chosen, his letter was more clever than honest. He made choice of a Greek monk, a native of Tarsus, named Theodore, who had joined the Roman Church; and as the Greeks held unorthodox opinions, he sent with him Hadrian, an African, abbot of the Niridan monastery, near Naples, that he might prevent him from teaching any wrong doctrines. Theodore was consecrated by the Pope in 668, and set out for England with Hadrian and Benedict Biscop, of whom much will be said in the volume of this series on monasticism. Both Theodore and Hadrian were learned men, and the archbishop gathered round him a number of students, whom they instructed in arts and sciences as well as in Biblical knowledge. They also taught Latin and Greek so thoroughly that some of their scholars spoke both languages as readily as English, and for the first time England had a learned native clergy. Many of their scholars became teachers of others, and in the darkest period of ignorance in Gaul, England, and especially Northumbria, entered on a period of literary splendour that lasted until the Danish invasions.

      His ecclesiastical organization.

      As the Church was now rapidly passing from the missionary to the pastoral stage of its existence, it needed organization as a permanent institution. This organization was given to it by Theodore. He established his authority over the whole Church, and, long before any one thought of a national monarchy, planned a national archiepiscopate. He made a visitation of every see, and for the first time every bishop owned obedience to Canterbury; while, as far as the English were concerned, he virtually brought the schism to an end by enforcing the decision of the Synod of Whitby. When he came to York he told Ceadda that his consecration was uncanonical. The saintly bishop declared his readiness to resign; he had ever, he said, deemed himself unworthy of the episcopal office. Theodore was touched by his humility, and reordained him; he received the Mercian bishopric, and lived for a little while in great holiness at Lichfield. Wilfrith was restored to York, and ruled his diocese with magnificence. When Theodore had thus established his authority, he proceeded to give the Church a diocesan system and a means of legislation in ecclesiastical matters. He called a national council of the Church to meet at Hertford; it was attended by the bishops and several “masters of Church,” men learned in ecclesiastical affairs, and in it the archbishop produced a body of canons which were universally accepted. These canons declared that the Roman Easter was to be observed everywhere; that no bishop should intrude into another’s diocese; that no priest should minister out of his own diocese without producing letters of recommendation; that a synod of the whole Church should be held every year at Clevesho, probably near London; and that more bishops were needed, a matter which it was decided to defer for the present.

      Creation of new dioceses.

      Instead of the symmetrical arrangement contemplated by Gregory, certain bishoprics were of immense size, for the diocese in each case was simply the kingdom looked at from an ecclesiastical point of view, and as the boundaries of a kingdom were changed by the fortune of war the diocese was enlarged or diminished. The whole of Central England was included in the one Mercian diocese, and the whole of Northumbria—for Lindisfarne was now without a separate bishop—lay in the diocese of Wilfrith. Theodore saw that it was necessary to subdivide these and other dioceses, and his intention was approved at Rome. His plan of procedure was first to gain the approval of the king whose kingdom would be affected by the change he wished to make, and then to obtain the consent of the witan. Hitherto the dioceses had been based on political circumstances; the new dioceses were generally formed on tribal lines. He divided East Anglia into two dioceses. The North folk and the South folk each had a bishop of their own, and the new see was placed at Elmham. Mercia was divided into five dioceses; the Hwiccan, the Hecanan, the Mercians proper, the Middle Angles, and the Lindsey folk each received a bishop, and the five sees were respectively at Worcester, Hereford, Lichfield, Leicester, and Sidnacester. The division of the West Saxon see was put off until the death of the bishop. In dealing with the Northumbrian diocese King Ecgfrith and the archbishop seem to have expected opposition from Wilfrith, for they divided his diocese in a council at which he was not present. According to the plan then adopted, Theodore consecrated bishops for Deira, Bernicia, and Lindsey, which, though originally part of the Mercian diocese, had lately been added to the Northumbrian kingdom and bishopric by conquest.

      Wilfrith’s first appeal to Rome, 678.

      Wilfrith appeared before the king and the archbishop, and demanded to be told why he was thus deprived of his rights. No answer was given him, and he appealed to the judgment of the Apostolic See. This appeal to Rome against the decision of a king and his witan, and of an archbishop acting in concert, the first that was ever made by an Englishman, is a notable event. It was greeted with the jeers of the great men of the court. Wilfrith went to Rome in person, and Theodore appeared by a proctor. Pope Agatho and his council decreed that Wilfrith should be reinstated, that his diocese should be divided, but that he should choose the new bishops, and that Theodore’s bishops should be turned out. Wilfrith returned in triumph, bringing the papal decrees with their bulls (seals) attached. A witenagemót was held to hear them, and the king and his nobles decided to disregard them. Wilfrith was imprisoned, and Theodore made a further division of his diocese by establishing a see at Abercorn, and appointed bishops for Lindisfarne, Hexham, and perhaps Ripon without consulting him. After Wilfrith was released he was forced by the hatred of Ecgfrith to wander about seeking shelter, until at last he found it among the heathen South Saxons. He converted them to Christianity, and lived as their bishop at Selsey. Then he preached to the people of the Isle of Wight, and by their conversion completed the work that Augustin came to do. The death of Ecgfrith made it possible for Theodore to come to terms with him. The archbishop and the injured bishop were reconciled in 686, and at Theodore’s request Ealdfrith, the new king of Northumbria, reinstated Wilfrith as bishop of York. Nevertheless the division that Theodore had made was not disturbed, and he only presided over the Deiran diocese. He is driven from York a second time, 691.After some years he and Ealdfrith had a dispute about the rights and possessions of his see. He was again driven from York, and again appealed to Rome. Pope Sergius took his part. But Ealdfrith, though a religious man, was not more inclined to submit to papal interference than his predecessor. He found an ally in Archbishop Brihtwald, for Theodore was now dead, and in spite of the Pope’s mandates, Wilfrith’s claims were rejected by a national synod of the Church. He again appealed to Rome, and was excommunicated by the English bishops. Again he journeyed to Rome, and John VI. pronounced a decree in his favour. Ealdfrith, however, declared that he would never change his decision for papal writings, and it was not until after his death that a compromise was effected in a Northumbrian synod held on the Nidd in 705. Dies

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