A new Chantries’ Act was passed in the first parliament of Edward VI.[463] The object of this Act was essentially different from that of its predecessor. The preamble to the Act specified that it was thought that “a great part of superstition and errors in Christian religion has been brought into the minds and estimation of men, by reason of their ignorance of the very true and perfect Salvation through Christ Jesus, and by devising and fancying vain opinions of purgatory and masses satisfactory to be done for them which be departed, the which doctrine and vain opinion by nothing more is maintained and upholden than by the abuse of trentals, chantries, and other provisions made for the continuance of the said blindness and ignorance.”
The Act proceeded to vest in the Crown “all Colleges, Free Chapels and Chantries”; “all Lands given for the finding of a Stipendiary Priest for ever”; “all payments made by corporations, gilds, fraternities, companies, or fellowships, of mysteries or crafts.”
A commission was to be issued, under the Great Seal, to investigate the origin and purpose of the various chantries, etc., to arrange for the continuance of such charitable objects as they deemed necessary, and to assign pensions to the incumbents whose office was abolished.
It is to the returns that were made to these commissioners that we are mainly indebted for a knowledge of the objects and purposes for which the chantries were provided. The purposes, which are most frequently mentioned, are:—
1. Provision of a priest to teach children freely.
2. Assistance of the parish priest.
3. Care of bridges.
4. Relief of the poor.
5. Provision of almshouses.
6. Repairing the parish church.
7. Equipping soldiers.
8. Repairing the sea walls.
9. Provision of lamps.
10. Provision of dowries.
Of these purposes, the most important was probably the provision of an endowment to enable a priest to keep a school. Mr. Leach, who was the first writer to realise fully the significance of the chantries in relation to the provision of facilities for education, states that “in all 259 schools appear in these records.”[464] Two or three examples will serve to make clear the nature of the provision for education made by the chantry bequests.
“Wymborne.
Cantaria Margarite Comitisse Rychemond et Derbie matris Domini Regis Henrici Septimi.
Memorandum that this was foundyd to the intent that the incumbent thereof should say masse for the solles of the founders and to be a Scolemaster, to teche frely almanner of childern Gramer within the said College.”[465]
“The Parish of Newland.