"The next in order are the Spiritual lords. These consist of two archbishops and twenty-four bishops; and at the dissolution of monasteries by Henry VIII. consisted likewise of twenty-six mitred abbots, and two priors: a very considerable body, and in those times equal in number to the temporal nobility. All these hold, or are supposed to hold, certain ancient baronies, under the king: for William the Conqueror thought proper to change the spiritual tenure of frank-almoign, or free alms, under which the bishops held their lands during the Saxon government, into feodal or Norman tenure by barony; which subjected their estates to all civil charges and assessments from which they were before exempt: and in right of succession to those baronies, which were unalienable from their respective dignities, the bishops and abbots were allowed their seats in the House of Lords."
Sir Matthew Hale divides the king's extraordinary councils into two kinds: 1. Secular or temporal councils; 2. Ecclesiastical or spiritual: the king's extraordinary secular councils being the Houses of the Peers and of the Commons; and the extraordinary ecclesiastical, the Upper and Lower Houses of Convocation.
Some illustration of this may be perhaps found in the following extract from an appendix to A Narrative of the Proceedings of the Lower House of Convocation, published by T. Bennet, London, 1701, in which Prelates are Spiritual Lords, whether Bishops or Abbots; and the phrase "full Parliament" seems equivalent to the ones used in the Gunpowder Treason Service:—
"When the several Estates were assembled in full Parliament, and received the King's commands concerning the business which they were to consider, and were adjourned by him to another day of full Parliament, in which they were to meet, and give their answer: the Clergy, and Lords, and Commons consulted in the mean time separately, ... Instances of this are not necessary, but one may be seen among the Records in the appendix to a late book call'd Essays concerning the Balance of Power, &c., and 'tis this: 6 Edw. III. Part 3. N. 1., on Tuesday in Full Parliament the King charged the Prelates, Earls, Barons, and other Great Men, and the Knights of the Shires, and the Commons, that having regard to the honor and profit of his Realm, they should give him their counsel. The which Prelates with the Clergy by themselves, and the Earls and Barons by themselves, and the knights and others of the counties and the Commons by themselves, treated and consulted till Friday next, the day assigned for the next session, and there in full Parliament, each by themselves and afterward all in common, answered."
The formation and development of Convocation, at least that of Canterbury, presents a great analogy to the English Parliament; as that of York does to the Scottish Parliament.
We must remember that before the Norman times, the clergy were exempt from all taxation; inasmuch as "they held in Frankalmoigne," that is, held their lands, &c., on free alms "in liberam eleemosynam." Littleton (lib. ii. c. 6. s. 135.) says:
"And they which hold in Frankalmoigne are bound of right before God to make orisons, prayers, masses, and other divine services for the soul of their grantor or feoffer, and for the souls of their heirs which are dead," &c.
The king's succeeding William the Conqueror tried to make the clergy contribute to the public exchequer, but were effectually resisted. In order to surmount the difficulty, King John (A.D. 1206) summoned all the priors and abbots to parliament, and obtained from them a vote of a thirteenth: and then wrote to the archdeacons to get the same from the clergy generally. Edward I. rendered this scheme for the taxation of the clergy complete. He applied to the Archbishops of Canterbury and York to assemble, by their canonical authority, the convocations of each province; and these Metropolitans, moved by the King's writ (the same practice is settled now), summoned these bishops and clergy.
The earliest royal writ, summoning a provincial synod, is dated Nov. 24, 1282, and calling them to meet at Northampton: "Venire ... coram nobis apud Northampton."
This Convocation assembled at Northampton; and we find another mandate from the Archbishop to the dean of the province, directing him to summon the bishops and clergy to a Convocation for the 9th of May, 1283, at the New Temple (now the Inner and Middle Temples), pursuant to a resolution of the Convocation of Northampton. At this Convocation, the proctors of the clergy refused to pay the tenth. Eleven years after, we find Edward summoning the whole body of the bishops and clergy to Westminster on St. Matthew's day, 1294. His writ orders "The dean and archdeacon to appear in their proper persons, the chapter by one, and the clergy of the diocese by two procurators." The clergy objected to this writ as uncanonical, and claimed to be convoked only by their Metropolitans; as tending to abolish their provincial synods convened by regular ecclesiastical authority, and to establish in their place a parliamentary chamber under secular authority. The King, finding them so opposed to his project of thus making them a part of the Third Estate, reverted to the established practice, and addressed his writs to the Archbishops; whereupon the Metropolitans issued their mandates, Convocations met, and subsidies were voted.