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Chapter XIII: Restoration,
1405-1459


These negotiations were finally concluded at the great Clunaic Monastery of Pontefract, and in 1424 King James I. returned to his own country, having learned many lessons during his captivity well calculated to help him in his administration. He addressed himself with great zeal to the pacification of his kingdom. “Let God but grant me life,” he said, “and there shall not be one spot in my dominions where the key shall not keep the castle, and the furze bush the cow, though I myself should lead the life of a dog to accomplish it.” He appears to have been true to his word. The only occasion on which his name appears in the Chartulary is in connection with the settlement of a dispute between the Convent and a certain Godfrey Nisbet, [7] regarding the lands of Achinhoss, [8] in the Barony of Renfrew. The King heard both parties in his council in the December of the same year of his return, and decided in favour of the Abbot. [9] He seems to have been earnestly desirous to promote the welfare of the Church. Heretical opinions were beginning to take root in the country, and the King felt that the only way of meeting them was by a revival of church discipline and vigour. He addressed a letter [10] to the Abbots of the Benedictine and Augustinian Monasteries, [11] exhorting them “in the bowels of the Lord Jesus Christ to shake off their torpor and sloth, and set themselves to work, to restore their fallen discipline, and rekindle their decaying fervour, so that they might save their houses from the ruin which menaced them.” There is some ground for believing that the Abbey of Paisley was not without need of the royal warning it thus received, and there is a very suspicious circumstance recorded about this time, which shows that it was not keeping by the rules of its Order so strictly as it should have done. Before William de Cheshelme had been made Abbot he acted vigorously for the Convent, in defence of its rights, and especially in resisting the demands of the vicars who served its churches, when they plead for augmentation of their stipends. To some of these needy priests the Convent gave doles beyond what it owed them, and the brethren in chapter gave William de Cheshelme leave to try and induce them to be contented with their legal stipends, and to “keep to himself and for his own use,” in consideration of his trouble, and the ex¬pense he had been at, all in excess of this. This was clearly an infraction of the rule which did not allow any monk to hold property of his own, and they boldly and shamefully mention in the record of their grant to Cheshelme [12] that they do this, “notwithstanding any statutes and customs of their order to the contrary.” This was a very reprehensible transaction, and shows that Paisley, in common with other monasteries in Scotland, had allowed its discipline to fall into neglect. The renunciation of property, abstinence, and simplicity in food and clothing, and other virtues strictly enjoined by the monastic rules, were now but rarely practised. “Not only the Abbots and other superiors kept luxurious tables, dwelt in magnificent halls, wore costly garments, and were attended by youth of good families as pages in rich liveries, but the private monks also spurned the sober fare, homely garb and devout retirement of their predecessors. They kept horses, and on various pretences were continually going about in public ; they lived separately upon portions allowed them out of the common stock ; they bought their own clothes ; and the common dormitory in which they slept was partitioned off into separate chambers.” [13] This was the case with the Cistercians of Melrose and Balmerino, and there is too much reason to think that much the same state of matters prevailed among the Clunaics of Paisley. Abbot Lithgow was a very old man, and could not hold the reins of government with a firm hand William Cheshelme, his coadjutor, appears to have joined in the abuses of the house, and was often absent. The place became, in the words of the chronicler, “out of all gude rewle.” [14]


[7] The Nisbets were proprietors of the lands of Johnstone, now called Milliken, in the Parish of Kilbarchan ; and the heiress was married to Thomas Wallace, a younger son of Ellerslie.
[8] Auchinhoss—Auchinhouse was situated in Houston Parish, on the banks of the river Gryfe.
[9] Reg. de Pas., p. 70.
[10] In 1424.
[11] Robertson's Statuta Eccles. Scot., Vol. I., p. lxxxix.
[12] Reg. de Pas., p. 336.
[13] Balmerino and its Abbey, p. 108.
[14] Chronicle of Achinleck, p. 19.