Three corollaries: privilege implies reason; punishment as the fugitive’s privilege; no courts or fairs in holy places

From these a threefold corollary is clear. First, the declaration and confirmation of the definitiondescripcio: definition of the aforesaid privilegeprivilegium / privilegiare / privilegiacio: privilege / to privilege / privileging.¹ It is clear, second (since the act of privileging by the kings of the earth must be copied from the privilegingprivilegium / privilegiare / privilegiacio: privilege / to privilege / privileging of the holy Roman churchecclesia: church, which must tacitly understand a condition, as God too must, from whom all privileging is copied), that the kings of the earth must tacitly understand the reasonableness of the privilege, so that it may not tend to anyone’s injury; and if [a king] has done so in ignorance, the error, once perceived, must at once be revoked, by Christ’s command and by his pure licence.² And it is clear, third, that it is foolish to inferconcludere: to infer from the bare words of a privilege some so-calledvocatus (vocata bona, vocata ecclesia): so-called privileges which are manifest errors; because (as is clear from the fifth [book] of the Ethics, last chapter, on epieikeia) in such things one must tacitly understand a condition taken from the end. For otherwise, besides the threefold absurdityinconveniencia; inconveniens: CONTEXTUAL: an absurdity (in argument) · troubles, ill consequences (in affairs) (drawn out in the preceding chapter), a manifest blasphemy would follow: for example, the king of England grants to every such fugitive liberty of every kind; now freedom from sin is the greatest, without which there is no true liberty at all; therefore the king grants to every such man that he be free from sin.³ Since this tends to blasphemy, it is manifest that this was not the king’s intention, but that they should have whatever earthly privilege lies within his power, both in goods of nature and in goods of fortune.

From these, third, it is gathered that by virtue of the said privilege many fugitives to the said place ought in [such a] case to be sharply punished, deprived of the goods of others that they occupy, and purged by other medicines, both bodily and spiritual, tending to the health of their souls. This is clear from the fact that there, by virtue of the privilege, they will have what 234rather turns to their advantage; now in such a case this would be medicine; therefore the conclusion.⁴ Hence three things move to this: the king’s privileging; the end for the sake of which the privilege is granted to that place; and the benefit which the king, in charity, ought to intend for the fugitive. For if the king in error intended an end opposed to that, then, if he has not been purged of that error, his punishment is aggravated by whatever malice follows directly from it; and not only this, but [so is] the sin of the surviving kings, lords and prelates who out of sloth omit the correction they owe.⁵ For in distinction 83 it is written thus: "An error that is not resisted is approved, and truth, when it is not defended, is crushed. For to neglect to disturb the perverse, when you can, is nothing other than to foster them. Nor is he free from the scruple of a hidden fellowship who ceases to oppose a manifest crime." And would that our lords, our prelates and our schoolmen attended to that saying! For the whole labour of the schools ought to tend to this end, out of zeal for the Lord of truth, against whom offence is given.⁶

And the quiet of the monks living there tends to the same. For since every hurtful disturbance draws its origin from sin, it is clear that the monks would not be quieted but disturbed by favour to and support of sinners. And if it is said that it is gain for them, since the fugitives share out the temporal goodstemporalia: temporal goods they bring, an accusing aggravation is added: that men so holy, so estranged from the world, should be companions of thieves, communicating with the excommunicate, who hinder their contemplation and quiet in the Lord; for in Isaiah 9:5 it is written: "Every violent taking of spoils [is] with tumult." Indeed, since the holiness of a place 235is drawn chiefly from those who dwell in it, it is clear that such an infection of the monks detracts from the holiness and reverence of the place which the privileging king intended.⁷

Nor does it avail to say (as I have heard some feign) that within the place those injured would have the full measure of justice against the refugees, who would answer [at law] there.⁸ First, because the praiseworthy usage of the kingdom, of holding the contentious court in a profane place, ought not, for such wrongdoing, to be transferred into the house of prayer or a holy place. Second, because harm of soul would be inflicted on the monks, for whose quiet the king provided so tenderly, since [there would be] disquiet drawing them away from contemplation, the opposite of which the privileger intended. Third, because it is against divine lawius: right / law and the law of the church to violate the bridesponsa / sponsus: bride / bridegroom of Christ or her place. Hence in the Sext, De immunitate ecclesiarum, chapter Decet, after it is shown from scripture that holiness becomes the house of God in many ways, it is inferred thus: "Let no one, in the same places in which it is fitting that vows be celebrated with peace and quiet, stir up sedition, raise an outcry, or commit violence; let there cease in them all councils of corporations and societies, disputes and public parliaments; let vain talk cease, and much more foul and profane talk; let all chatter cease; but, finally, let whatever else could disturb the divine office or offend the eyes of the divine majesty be wholly foreign to them, lest where pardon for sins is to be asked, there occasion of sinning be given, or sins be found committed. Let there cease in churches and their cemeteries trading, and especially the tumult of fairs and of any market 236. Let all the din of secular judgments be quiet in them. Let no cause, especially a criminal one, be pleaded there by laymen; let the same places be strangers to gatherings of laymen." Thus far there.⁹ How, I ask, could the church be a fomenter of crimes, or defend any who offend against it? Hence on the word Sedicionem the glossglosa: gloss says that one who commits theft in a church shall not have immunity in it; and Hostiensis holds this, and rightly, since he invokes the aidsuffragium sensus: aid of sense of a place in vain who defiles it.¹⁰

Since, then, whoever offends in one point is become guilty of all, it is manifest that everyone who sins mortally within a church steals [its] spiritual aid, by which God is offended more than by a theft of temporal goods. Indeed, since everyone who occupies temporal goods in mortal [sin] falls short of the right of using anything, it is then manifest that he steals the goods of the church in which he rests.¹¹ If, then, he is a transgressorprevaricator; prevaricancia: transgressor; transgression of the tenth commandment who unjustly covets the goods of others, much more is he a transgressor of the decalogue who fraudulently and unjustly withholds the goods of others. If, then, it is not lawful for anyone to dispense with any of the Lord’s commandments, it seems manifest that it is not within human power to privilege a place or a man so that it may be lawful for him to live against the Lord’s command.¹²

And here some wonder how, since it is a privilege for holy places that they be exempted from every tumult of secular business, the higher superiorsprepositi: superiors of the church, namely bishops, priors and abbots, not only permit but claim as a privilege, and obstinately defend, that in their churches and their cemeteries there be fairs and secular business, which are never carried on without fraud and manifold crime. Now, since it is not possible that two contraries be at once a privilege to the same church, it is manifest that one must either deny the privilege of divine law and canon law concerning the exemptionexempcio: exemption 237of the church from the tumult of secular business, or grant that this is a privilege that hinders good morals.¹³ And I believe that our clergyecclesiastici: CONTEXTUAL: clergy / those who belong to the church would assent to this teachingsentencia: CONTEXTUAL: teaching / sentence if they were not blinded by the gain of temporal goods; the proof of which would be [this]: if the prince took away the profit, the privilege would be renounced. But it seems most wicked and sacrilegious to sell a divine privilege for money.¹⁴ And by the same token [that reply] is disposed oftollere (instanciam, argumentum): to dispose of, demolish, so that the laws of England should not be changed, on the pretext of an error in this privilege, by bringing the King’s Bench, its judge, or secular pleading into the house of the Lord; for then "the last error would be worse than the first", since an error of ignorance committed against God would be more fully increased by supine contempt; for one sin, ensnaring, draws [a man] more deeply to another.¹⁵

As to the third person, namely those who flee, it is clear that the privileger intends the advantage of the fugitive; for otherwise it would not be alms or a work of mercy to him, but wholly the contrary, if he intended to harm his neighbour. Now, that in [such a] case it would be a privilege to a fugitive to be so punished is clear, supposing that some, taking occasion amiss from the security of such a refuge, injure their neighbours and so harm their own souls by sin.¹⁶ I suppose, second, that it would be a greater work of mercy to hinder one who thus kills his own soul than one who wishes to kill a bare body. And from these, third, it is argued thus: every greater good work of mercy is rather to be bestowed; now it is a greater good work of mercy to withdraw a good from such a man in the case specified, and to chastise the frenzied for their everlasting health, than in this way to relieve one who is needy only in bodily goods; therefore one who is able ought rather to bestow that alms. Supposing, then, the case of fugitives who have thus done harm elsewhere, the conclusion is clear.¹⁷