The Eve of the Reformation. Gasquet Francis Aidan

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fall of Constantinople in 1453 gave the required stimulus here, as in Italy. Among the fugitives were many Greek scholars of eminence, such as Chalcocondylas, Andronicus, Constantine and John Lascaris, who quickly made the schools of Italy famous by their teaching. Very soon the fame of the new masters spread to other countries, and students from all parts of the Western World found their way to their lecture-halls in Rome and the other teaching centres established in the chief cities of Northern Italy.

      First among the scholars who repaired thither from England to drink in the learning of ancient Greece and bring back to their country the new spirit, we must place two Canterbury monks named Selling and Hadley. Born somewhere about 1430, William Selling became a monk at Christchurch, Canterbury, somewhere about 1448. There seems some evidence to show that his family name was Tyll, and that, as was frequently, if not generally, the case, on his entering into religion, he adopted the name of Selling from his birthplace, some five miles from Faversham in Kent.13 It is probable that Selling, after having passed through the claustral school at Canterbury, on entering the Benedictine Order was sent to finish his studies at Canterbury College, Oxford. Here he certainly was in 1450, for in that year he writes a long and what is described as an elegant letter as a student at Canterbury College to his Prior, Thomas Goldstone, at Christchurch Canterbury.14 He was ordained priest, and celebrated his first mass at Canterbury in September 1456.15

      In 1464 William Selling obtained leave of his Prior and convent to go with a companion, William Hadley, to study in the foreign universities for three years,16 during which time they visited and sat under the most celebrated teachers at Padua, Bologna, and Rome.17 At Bologna, according to Leland, Selling was the pupil of the celebrated Politian, “with whom, on account of his aptitude in acquiring the classical elegance of ancient tongues, he formed a familiar and lasting friendship.”18 In 1466 and 1467 we find the monks, Selling and his companion Hadley, at Bologna, where apparently the readers in Greek then were Lionorus and Andronicus,19 and where, on the 22nd March 1466, Selling took his degree in theology, his companion taking his in the March of the following year.20

      Of this period of work, Leland says: – “His studies progressed. He indeed imbued himself with Greek; everywhere he industriously and at great expense collected many Greek books. Nor was his care less in procuring old Latin MSS., which shortly after he took with him, as the most estimable treasures, on his return to Canterbury.”21

      His obituary notice in the Christchurch Necrology recites not only his excellence in learning, classical and theological, but what he had done to make his monastery at Canterbury a real house of studies. He decorated the library over the Priests’ Chapel, adding to the books, and assigned it “for the use of those specially given to study, which he encouraged and cherished with wonderful watchfulness and affection.” The eastern cloister also he fitted with glass and new desks, “called carrels,” for the use of the studious brethren.22

      After the sojourn of the two Canterbury monks in Italy, they returned to their home at Christchurch. Selling, however, did not remain there long, for on October 3, 1469, we find him setting out again for Rome23 in company with another monk, Reginald Goldstone, also an Oxford student. This visit was on business connected with his monastery, and did not apparently keep him long away from England, for there is evidence that sometime before the election of Selling to the Priorship at Canterbury, which was in 1472, he was again at his monastery. Characteristically, his letter introducing William Worcester, the antiquary, to a merchant of Lucca who had a copy of Livy’s Decades for sale, manifests his great and continued interest in classical literature.24

      At Canterbury, Selling must have established the teaching of Greek on systematic lines, and it is certainly from this monastic school as a centre, that the study spread to other parts of England. William Worcester, keenly alive to the classical revival, as his note-books show, tells us of “certain Greek terminations as taught by Doctor Selling of Christchurch, Canterbury,” and likewise sets down the pronunciation of the Greek vowels with examples evidently on the same authority.25

      Selling’s long priorship, extending from 1472 to 1495, would have enabled him to consolidate the work of this literary renaissance which he had so much at heart.26 The most celebrated of all his pupils was, of course, Linacre. Born, according to Caius, at Canterbury, he received his first instruction in the monastic school there, and his first lessons in the classics and Greek from Selling himself. Probably through the personal interest taken in this youth of great promise by Prior Selling, he was sent to Oxford about 1480. Those who have seriously examined the matter believe that the first years of his Oxford life were spent by Linacre at the Canterbury College, which was connected with Christchurch monastery, and which, though primarily intended for monks, also afforded a place of quiet study to others who were able to obtain admission.27 Thus, in later years, Sir Thomas More, no doubt through his father’s connection with the monastery of Christchurch, Canterbury, of which house he was a “confrater,” became a student at the monks’ college at Oxford. In later years Sir Thomas himself, when Chancellor of England, perpetuated the memory of his life-long connection with the monks of Canterbury by enrolling his name also on the fraternity lists of that house.

      Linacre, in 1484, became a Fellow of All Souls’ College, but evidently he did not lose touch with his old friends at Canterbury, for, in 1486, Prior Selling being appointed one of the ambassadors of Henry VII. to the Pope, he invited his former pupil to accompany him to Italy, in order to profit by the teaching of the great humanist masters at the universities there. Prior Selling took him probably as far as Florence, and introduced him to his own old master and friend, Angelo Politian, who was then engaged in instructing the children of Lorenzo de Medici. Through Selling’s interest, Linacre was permitted to share in their lessons, and there are letters showing that the younger son, when in after years he became Pope, as Leo X., was not unmindful of his early companionship with the English scholar.28 From Politian, Linacre acquired a purity of style in Latin which makes him celebrated even among the celebrated men of his time. Greek he learnt from Demetrius Chalcocondylas, who was then, like Politian, engaged in teaching the children of Lorenzo de Medici.29

      From Florence, Linacre passed on to Rome, where he gained many friends among the great humanists of the day. One day, when examining the manuscripts of the Vatican Library for classics, and engaged in reading the Phædo of Plato, Hermolaus Barbarus came up and politely expressed his belief that the youth had no claim, as he had himself, to the title Barbarus, if it were lawful to judge from his choice of a book. Linacre at once, from the happy compliment, recognised the speaker, and this chance interview led to a life-long friendship between the Englishman and one of the great masters of classical literature.30

      After Linacre had been in Italy for a year or more, a youth whom he had known at Oxford, William Grocyn, was induced to come and share with him the benefit of the training in literature then to be obtained only in Italy. On his return in 1492, Grocyn became lecturer at Exeter College, Oxford, and among his pupils in Greek were Sir Thomas More31 and Erasmus. He was a graduate in theology, and was chosen by Dean Colet to give lectures at St. Paul’s and subsequently appointed by Archbishop Warham, Master or Guardian of the collegiate church of Maidstone.32 Erasmus describes him as “a man of most rigidly upright life, almost superstitiously observant of ecclesiastical custom, versed in every nicety of scholastic theology, by nature of the most acute judgment, and, in a word, fully instructed

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