A.D. 1200. DECREES OF THE SYNOD OE LONDON. nasteries for money, nor are they to be allowed to hold private property of their own ; nor are they to be placed alone in vills and towns, or in any parish churches ; but they are to remain in the general convent, or with some others of the brethren, and not alone among secular people to await the attack of their spiritual foes; for it is Solomon who says, 'Woe to him that is alone when he falleth, for he hath not another to help him up.'66 And if any person, on demand made, shall pay anything for his admission he shall not be admitted to canonical orders ; and he who receives the same, is to be punished by loss of his office. If any [monk] also shall have any private property, unless he shall have received permission from the abbat for the administration of certain duties enjoined, the said person is to be removed from the communion of the altar ; and for him who at the point of death shall be found to be in possession of private property, no offering is to be made, and he is not to receive burial among the brotherhood. The same also, we do enact, with reference to the various religious orders ; and the abbat who shall not with due diligence pay attention to the same, is to know that he will thereby incur the loss of his office. Priorships also, or abbacies,67 are to be given to no person for the receipt of money ; and if this shall be transgressed, let both the giver and the receiver, be removed from the administration of their ecclesiastical duties. Also, when priors shall have been appointed in conventual churches, they shall not, except for manifest and reasonable cause, be changed ; unless, for instance, they have been guilty of dilapidation, or lived incontinently, or have been guilty of any offence of a like nature for which they shall appear to deserve to be removed, or if they shall have to be transferred through the necessity of their filling some higher office. It seems also proper to be added, that monks or black canons, or black nuns, are not to use coloured hoods, but black ones only ; and they are to use cloaks of only black or white, with the skins of lambs, cats, or foxes. Monks also, and other persons of the religious orders, are not to use hats, or to go away from their convents on pretence of making pilgrimages. We do also enact, that in every church of monks, or of any religious persons canonically appropriated to their use, a vicar shall, under the superintendence of the bishop, be appointed, who shall « Eccl.iv. 10. 6 7 In the text " obedientiae." This was a name sometimes given to the abbacy, and sometimes to any ecclesiastical office whatever. Κ κ 2