CHAPTER II.
RETROSPECT.
Three centuries and more have rolled away since the dissolution of the monasteries, which once rose in architectural beauty in each district of mediæval England, gladdening the eye of the wayfarer with the assurance of hospitality, and of the poor with that of help and protection.
Their pious founders built in marble—
“Built as they
Who hoped those stones should see the day
When Christ should come; and that those walls
Might stand o’er them till judgment calls.”
Alas! for such hopes; the tyrant Tudor, taking advantage of the palpable declension of the inmates from their first love, levelled them with the ground, and left the country shorn of such glorious fanes as arose over the conquerors at Battle, or the tombs of the mighty dead at Glastonbury. Yet still they had welcomed the wayfarer and the stranger, tended the sick, taught the young, found labour for the poor, were good masters to their tenants, built bridges, made roads, and were the centres of civilization in their several districts.