At last (A. D. 1324) the pope, the bishops, and the Hospitallers, by their united exertions, succeeded in obtaining an act of parliament, vesting all the property late belonging to the Templars in the brethren of the Hospital of Saint John, in order that the intentions of the donors might be carried into effect by the appropriation of it to the defence of the Holy Land and the succour of the christian cause in the East.[451] This statute gave rise to the greatest discontent. The heirs of the donors petitioned parliament for its repeal, alleging that it had been made against law and against reason, and contrary to the opinion of the judges;[452] and many of the great barons who held the property by a title recognised by the common law, successfully resisted the claims of the order of the Hospital, maintaining that the parliament had no right to interfere with the tenure of private property, and to dispose of their possessions without their consent.
This struggle between the heirs of the donors on the one hand, and the Hospitallers on the other, continued for a lengthened period; and in the reign of Edward the Third it was found necessary to pass another act of parliament, confirming the previous statute in their favour, and writs were sent to the sheriffs (A. D. 1334) commanding them to enforce the execution of the acts of the legislature, and to take possession, in the king’s name, of all the property unjustly detained from the brethren of the Hospital.[453]
Whilst the vast possessions, late belonging to the Templars, thus continued to be the subject of contention, the surviving brethren of that dissolved order continued to be treated with the utmost inhumanity and neglect. The ecclesiastical council had assigned to each of them a pension of fourpence a day for subsistence, but this small pittance was not paid, and they were consequently in great danger of dying of hunger. The king, pitying their miserable situation, wrote to the prior of the hospital of St. John at Clerkenwell, earnestly requesting him to take their hard lot into his serious consideration, and not suffer them to come to beggary in the streets.[454] The archbishop of Canterbury also exerted himself in their behalf, and sent letters to the possessors of the property, reproving them for the non-payment of the allotted stipends. “This inhumanity,” says he, “awakens our compassion, and penetrates us with the most lively grief. We pray and conjure you in kindness to furnish them, for the love of God and for charity, with the means of subsistence.”[455] The archbishop of York caused many of them to be supported in the different monasteries of his diocese.[456]
Many of the quondam Templars, however, after the dissolution of their order, assumed a secular habit; they blended themselves with the laity, mixed in the pleasures of the world, and even presumed to contract matrimony, proceedings which drew down upon them the severe indignation of the Roman pontiff. In a bull addressed to the archbishop of Canterbury, the pope stigmatises these marriages as unlawful concubinages; he observes that the late Templars remained bound, notwithstanding the dissolution of their order, by their vows of perpetual chastity, and he orders them to be separated from the women whom they had married, and to be placed in different monasteries, where they are to dedicate themselves to the service of God, and the strict performance of their religious vows.[457]
The Templars adopted the oriental fashion of long beards, and during the proscription of the fraternity, when the fugitives who had thrown off their habits were hunted out like wild beasts, it appears to have been dangerous for laymen to possess beards of more than a few weeks’ growth.
Papers and certificates were granted to men with long beards, to prevent them from being molested by the officers of justice as suspected Templars, as appears from the following curious certificate given by king Edward the Second to his valet, who had made a vow not to shave himself until he had performed a pilgrimage to a certain place beyond sea.
“Rex, etc. Cum dilectus valettus noster Petrus Auger, exhibitor præsentium, nuper voverit quod barbam suam radi non faciat, quousque peregrinationem fecerit in certo loco in partibus transmarinis; et idem Petrus sibi timeat, quod aliqui ipsum, ratione barbæ suæ prolixæ fuisse Templarium imponere sibi velint, et ei inferre impedimenta seu gravamina ex hac causa; Nos veritati volentes testimonium pertulere, vobis tenore præsentium intimamus, quod prædictus Petrus est valettus cameræ nostræ, nec unquam fuit Templarius, sed barbam suam sic prolixam esse permittit, ex causa superius annotata, etc. Teste Rege, &c.”[458]