The History of the Knights Templars, the Temple Church, and the Temple

CHAPTER XIII.
THE TEMPLE

Antiquities in the Temple – The history of the place subsequent to the dissolution of the order of the Knights Templars – The establishment of a society of lawyers in the Temple – The antiquity of this society – Its connexion with the antient society of the Knights Templars – An order of knights and serving brethren established in the law – The degree of frere serjen, or frater serviens, borrowed from the antient Templars – The modern Templars divide themselves into the two societies of the Inner and Middle Temple.

 
“Those bricky towers,
The which on Themme’s brode aged back do ride,
Where now the studious lawyers have their bowers;
There whilom wont the Templer Knights to bide,
Till they decayed thro’ pride.”
 

There are but few remains of the antient Knights Templars now existing in the Temple beyond the church. The present Inner Temple Hall was their antient hall, but it has at different periods been so altered and repaired as to have lost every trace and vestige of antiquity. In the year 1816 it was almost entirely rebuilt, and the following extract from “The Report and Observations of the Treasurer on the late Repairs of the Inner Temple Hall” may prove interesting, as showing the state of the edifice previous to that period.

“From the proportions, the state of decay, the materials of the eastern and southern walls, the buttresses of the southern front, the pointed form of the roof and arches, and the rude sculpture on the two doors of public entrance, the hall is evidently of very great antiquity… The northern wall appears to have been rebuilt, except at its two extremities, in modern times, but on the old foundations… The roof was found to be in a very decayed and precarious state; many timbers were totally rotten. It appeared to have undergone reparation at three separate periods of time, at each of which timber had been unnecessarily added, so as finally to accumulate a weight which had protruded the northern and southern walls. It became, therefore, indispensable to remove all the timber of the roof, and to replace it in a lighter form. On removing the old wainscoting of the western wall, a perpendicular crack of considerable height and width was discovered, which threatened at any moment the fall of that extremity of the building with its superincumbent roof… The turret of the clock and the southern front of the hall are only cased with stone; this was done in the year 1741, and very ill executed. The structure of the turret, composed of chalk, rag-stone, and rubble, (the same material as the walls of the church,) seems to be very antient… The wooden cupola of the bell was so decayed as to let in the rain, and was obliged to be renewed in a form to agree with the other parts of the southern front.”

“Notwithstanding the Gothic character of the building, in the year 1680, during the treasurership of Sir Thomas Robinson, prothonotary of C. B., a Grecian screen of the Doric order was erected, surmounted by lions’ heads, cones, and other incongruous devices.”

“In the year 1741, during the treasurership of John Blencowe, esq., low windows of Roman architecture were formed in the southern front.”

“The dates of such innovations appear from inscriptions with the respective treasurers’ names.”

This antient hall formed the far-famed refectory of the Knights Templars, and was the scene of their proud and sumptuous hospitality. Within its venerable walls they at different periods entertained king John, king Henry the Third, the haughty legates of Roman pontiffs, and the ambassadors of foreign powers. The old custom, alluded to by Matthew Paris,⁵⁴² of hanging around the wall the shields and armorial devices of the antient knights, is still preserved, and each succeeding treasurer of the Temple still continues to hoist his coat of arms on the wall, as in the high and palmy days of the warlike monks of old.

At the west end of the hall are considerable remains of the antient convent of the Knights Templars. A groined Gothic arch of the same style of architecture as the oldest part of the Temple Church forms the ceiling of the present buttery, and in the apartment beyond is a groined vaulted ceiling of great beauty. The ribs of the arches in both rooms are elegantly moulded, but are sadly disfigured with a thick coating of plaster and barbarous whitewash. In the cellars underneath these rooms are some old walls of immense thickness, the remains of an antient window, a curious fireplace, and some elegant pointed Gothic arches corresponding with the ceilings above; but they are now, alas! shrouded in darkness, choked with modern brick partitions and staircases, and soiled with the damp and dust of many centuries. These interesting remains form an upper and an under story, the floor of the upper story being on a level with the floor of the hall, and the floor of the under story on a level with the terrace on the south side thereof. They were formerly connected with the church by means of a covered way or cloister, which ran at right angles with them over the site of the present cloister-chambers, and communicated with the upper and under story of the chapel of St. Anne, which formerly stood on the south side of the church. By means of this corridor and chapel the brethren of the Temple had private access to the church for the performance of their strict religious duties, and of their secret ceremonies of admitting novices to the vows of the order. In 9 Jac. I. A. D. 1612, some brick buildings three stories high were erected over this antient cloister by Francis Tate, esq., and being burnt down a few years afterwards, the interesting covered way which connected the church with the antient convent was involved in the general destruction, as appears from the following inscription upon the present buildings:

“Vetustissima Templariorum porticu igne consumta, anno 1678, Nova hæc, sumptibus Medii Templi extructa anno 1681 Gulielmo Whitelocke armigero, thesaurario.

“The very antient portico of the Templars being consumed by fire in the year 1678, these new buildings were erected at the expense of the Middle Temple in the year 1681, William Whitlock, esq., being treasurer.”

The cloisters of the Templars formed the medium of communication between the hall, the church, and the cells of the serving brethren of the order.⁵⁴³

During the formation of the present new entrance into the Temple by the church, at the bottom of the Inner Temple-lane, a considerable portion of the brickwork of the old houses was pulled down, and an antient wall of great thickness was disclosed. It was composed of chalk, rag-stone, and rubble, exactly resembling the walls of the church. It ran in a direction east and west, and appeared to have formed the extreme northern boundary of the old convent.

The site of the remaining buildings of the antient Temple cannot now be determined with certainty.

The mansion-house, (Mansum Novi Templi,) the residence of the Master and knights, who were lodged separately from the serving brethren and ate at a separate table, appears to have stood at the east end of the hall, on the site of the present library and apartments of the masters of the bench.

The proud and powerful Knights Templars were succeeded in the occupation of the Temple by a body of learned lawyers, who took possession of the old hall and the gloomy cells of the military monks, and converted the chief house of their order into the great and most antient Common Law University of England.

For more than five centuries the retreats of the religious warriors have been devoted to “the studious and eloquent pleaders of causes,” a new kind of Templars, who, as Fuller quaintly observes, now “defend one Christian from another as the old ones did Christians from Pagans.” The modern Templars have been termed milites justitiæ, or “soldiers of justice,” for, as John of Salisbury, a writer of the twelfth century, saith, “neque reipublicæ militant soli illi, qui galeis thoracisque muniti in hostes exercent tela quælibet, sed et patroni causarum, qui lapsa erigunt, fatigata reparant, nec minus provident humano generi, quam si laborantium vitam, spem, posterosque, armorum præsidio, ab hostibus tuerentur.” “They do not alone fight for the state who, panoplied in helmets and breastplates, wield the sword and the dart against the enemy, for the pleaders of causes, who redress wrongs, who raise up the oppressed, do protect and provide for the human race as much as if they were to defend the lives, fortunes, and families of industrious citizens with the sword.”⁵⁴⁴

 
“Besides encounters at the bar
Are braver now than those in war,
In which the law does execution
With less disorder and confusion;
Has more of honour in’t, some hold,
Not like the new way, but the old,
When those the pen had drawn together
Decided quarrels with the feather,
And winged arrows killed as dead,
And more than bullets now of lead:
So all their combats now, as then,
Are managed chiefly by the pen;
That does the feat, with braver vigours,
In words at length, as well as figures.”
 

The settlement of the lawyers in the Temple was brought about in the following manner.

On the imprisonment of the Knights Templars, the chief house of the order in London, in common with the other property of the military monks, was seized into the king’s hands, and was committed to the care of James le Botiller and William de Basing, who, on the 9th of December, A. D. 1311, were commanded to hand it over to the sheriffs of London, to be taken charge of by them.⁵⁴⁵ Two years afterwards the Temple was granted to that powerful nobleman, Aymer de Valence, earl of Pembroke, who had been one of the leaders of the baronial conspiracy against Piers Gavaston.⁵⁴⁶ As Thomas earl of Lancaster, however, claimed the Temple by escheat as the immediate lord of the fee, the earl of Pembroke, on the 3rd of Oct., A. D. 1315, at the request of the king, and in consideration of other lands being granted to him by his sovereign, remised and released all his right and title therein to Lancaster.⁵⁴⁷ This earl of Lancaster was cousin-german to the English monarch, and first prince of the blood; he was the most powerful and opulent subject of the kingdom, being possessed of no less than six earldoms, with a proportionable estate in land, and at the time that the Temple was added to his numerous other possessions he was at the head of the government, and ruled both the king and country as president of the council. In an antient MS. account of the Temple, formerly belonging to lord Somers and afterwards to Nicholls, the celebrated antiquary, apparently written by a member of the Inner Temple, it is stated that the lawyers “made composition with the earl of Lancaster for a lodging in the Temple, and so came hither, and have continued here ever since.” That this was the case appears highly probable from various circumstances presently noticed.

The earl of Lancaster held the Temple rather more than six years and a half.

When the king’s attachment for Hugh le Despenser, another favourite, was declared, he raised the standard of rebellion. He marched with his forces against London, gave law to the king and parliament, and procured a sentence of attainder and perpetual exile against Hugh le Despenser. The fortune of war, however, soon turned against him. He was defeated, and conducted a prisoner to his own castle of Pontefract, where king Edward sat in judgment upon him, and sentenced him to be hung, drawn, and quartered, as a rebel and a traitor. The same day he was clothed in mean attire, was placed on a lean jade without a bridle, a hood was put on his head, and in this miserable condition he was led through the town of Pontefract to the place of execution, in front of his own castle.⁵⁴⁸

A few days afterwards, the king, whilst he yet tarried at Ponfract, granted the Temple to Aymer de Valence, earl of Pembroke, by a royal charter couched in the following terms: —

“Edward by the grace of God, king, &c., to the archbishops, bishops, abbots, priors, earls, barons, justiciaries, &c. &c., health. Know that on account of the good and laudable service which our beloved kinsman and faithful servant Aymer de Valence hath rendered and will continue to render to us, we have given and granted, and by our royal charter have confirmed to the said earl, the mansion-house and messuage called the New Temple in the suburb of London, with the houses, rents, and all other things to the same mansion-house and messuage belonging, formerly the property of the Templars, and afterwards of Thomas earl of Lancaster, our enemy and rebel, and which, by the forfeiture of the same Thomas, have come into our hands by way of escheat, to be had and holden by the same Aymer and the heirs of his body lawfully begotten, of us and our heirs, and the other chief lords of the fee, by the same services as those formerly rendered; but if the said Aymer shall die without heirs of his body lawfully begotten, then the said mansion-house, messuage, &c. &c., shall revert to us and our heirs.”⁵⁴⁹

Rather more than a year after the date of this grant, Aymer de Valence was murdered. He had accompanied queen Isabella to the court of her father, the king of France, and was there slain (June 23rd, A. D. 1323) by one of the English fugitives of the Lancastrian faction, in revenge for the death of the earl of Lancaster, whose destruction he was believed to have compassed. His dead body was brought over to England, and buried in Westminster Abbey at the head of Edmund Crouchback, earl of Lancaster. He left no issue, and the Temple, consequently, once more reverted to the crown.⁵⁵⁰

It was now granted to Hugh le Despenser the younger, the king’s favourite, at the very time that the act of parliament (17 Edward II.) was passed, conferring all the lands of the Templars upon the Hospitallers of St. John.⁵⁵¹ Hugh le Despenser, in common with the other barons, paid no attention to the parliament, and held the Temple till the day of his death, which happened soon after, for on the 24th of September, A. D. 1326, Queen Isabella landed in England with the remains of the Lancastrian faction; and after driving her own husband, Edward the Second, from the throne, she seized the favourite, and caused him instantly to be condemned to death. On St. Andrew’s Eve he was led out to execution; they put on him his surcoat of arms reversed, a crown of nettles was placed on his head, and on his vestment they wrote six verses of the psalm, beginning, Quid gloriaris in malitiâ.⁵⁵² After which he was hanged on a gallows eighty feet high, and was then beheaded, drawn, and quartered. His head was sent to London, and stuck upon the bridge; and of the four quarters of his body, one was sent to York, another to Bristol, another to Carlisle, and the fourth to Dover.⁵⁵³

Thus perished the last private possessor of the Temple at London.

The young prince, Edward the Third, now ascended the throne, leaving his parent, the dethroned Edward the Second, to the tender mercies of the gaolers of Berkeley Castle. He seized the Temple, as forfeited to him by the attainder of Hugh le Despenser, and committed it to the keeping of the mayor of London, his escheator in the city. The mayor, as guardian of the Temple, took it into his head to close the gate leading to the waterside, which stood at the bottom of the present Middle Temple Lane, whereby the lawyers were much incommoded in their progress backwards and forwards from the Temple to Westminster. Complaints were made to the king on the subject, who, on the 2nd day of November, in the third year of his reign, wrote as follows to the mayor:

“The king to the mayor of London, his escheator⁵⁵⁴ in the same city.

“Since we have been given to understand that there ought to be a free passage through the court of the New Temple at London to the river Thames, for our justices, clerks, and others, who may wish to pass by water to Westminster to transact their business, and that you keep the gate of the Temple shut by day, and so prevent those same justices, clerks of ours, and other persons, from passing through the midst of the said court to the waterside, whereby as well our own affairs as those of our people in general are oftentimes greatly hindered, we command you, that you keep the gates of the said Temple open by day, so that our justices and clerks, and other persons who wish to go by water to Westminster, may be able so to do by the way to which they have hitherto been accustomed.

“Witness ourself at Kenilworth, the 2nd day of November, and third year of our reign.”⁵⁵⁵

The following year the king again wrote to the mayor, his escheator in the city of London, informing him that he had been given to understand that the bridge in the said court of the Temple, leading to the river, was so broken and decayed, that his clerks and law officers, and others, could no longer get across it, and were consequently prevented from passing by water to Westminster. “We therefore,” he proceeds, “being desirous of providing such a remedy as we ought for this evil, command you to do whatever repairs are necessary to the said bridge, and to defray the cost thereof out of the proceeds of the lands and rents appertaining to the said Temple now in your custody; and when we shall have been informed of the things done in the matter, the expense shall be allowed you in your account of the same proceeds.

“Witness ourself at Westminster, the 15th day of January, and fourth year of our reign.”⁵⁵⁶

Two years afterwards (6 E. III, A. D. 1333) the king committed the custody of the Temple to “his beloved clerk,” William de Langford, “and farmed out the rents and proceeds thereof to him for the term of ten years, at a rent of 24l. per annum, the said William undertaking to keep all the houses and tenements in good order and repair, and so deliver them up at the end of the term.”⁵⁵⁷

In the mean time, however, the pope, the bishops, and the Hospitallers had been vigorously exerting themselves to obtain a transfer of the property, late belonging to the Templars, to the order of the Hospital of Saint John. The Hospitallers petitioned the king, setting forth that the church, the cloisters, and other places within the Temple, were consecrated and dedicated to the service of God, that they had been unjustly occupied and detained from them by Hugh le Despenser the younger, and, through his attainder, had lately come into the king’s hands, and they besought the king to deliver up to them possession thereof. King Edward accordingly commanded the mayor of London, his escheator in that city, to take inquisition concerning the premises.

From this inquisition, and the return thereof, it appears that many of the founders of the Temple Church, and many of the brethren of the order of Knights Templars, then lay buried in the church and cemetery of the Temple; that the bishop of Ely had his lodging in the Temple, known by the name of the bishop of Ely’s chamber; that there was a chapel dedicated to St. Thomas-à-Becket, which extended from the door of the Temple Hall as far as the ancient gate of the Temple; also a cloister which began at the bishop of Ely’s chamber, and ran in an easterly direction; and that there was a wall which ran in a northerly direction as far as the said king’s highway; that in the front part of the cemetery towards the north, bordering on the king’s highway, were thirteen houses formerly erected, with the assent and permission of the Master and brethren of the Temple, by Roger Blom, a messenger of the Temple, for the purpose of holding the lights and ornaments of the church; that the land whereon these houses were built, the cemetery, the church, and all the space inclosed between St. Thomas’s chapel, the church, the cloisters, and the wall running in a northerly direction, and all the buildings erected thereon, together with the hall, cloisters, and St. Thomas’s chapel, were sanctified places dedicated to God; that Hugh le Despenser occupied and detained them unjustly, and that through his attainder and forfeiture, and not otherwise, they came into the king’s hands.⁵⁵⁸

After the return of this inquisition, the said sanctified places were assigned to the prior and brethren of the Hospital of Saint John; and the king, on the 11th of January, in the tenth year of his reign, A. D. 1337, directed his writ to the barons of the Exchequer, commanding them to take inquisition of the value of the said sanctified places, so given up to the Hospitallers, and of the residue of the Temple, and certify the same under their seals to the king, in order that a reasonable abatement might be made in William de Langford’s rent. From the inquiry made in pursuance of this writ before John de Shorditch, a baron of the Exchequer, it further appears that on the said residue of the Temple upon the land then remaining in the custody of William de Langford, and withinside the great gate of the Temple, were another HALL⁵⁵⁹ and four chambers connected therewith, a kitchen, a garden, a stable, and a chamber beyond the great gate; also eight shops, seven of which stood in Fleet Street, and the eighth in the suburb of London, without the bar of the New Temple; that the annual value of these shops varied from ten to thirteen, fifteen, and sixteen shillings; that the fruit out of the garden of the Temple sold for sixty shillings per annum in the gross; that seven out of the thirteen houses erected by Roger Blom were each of the annual value of eleven shillings; and that the eighth, situated beyond the gate of entrance to the church, was worth four marks per annum. It appears, moreover, that the total annual revenue of the Temple then amounted to 73l. 6s. 11d., equal to about 1,000l. of our present money, and that William de Langford was abated 12l. 4s. 2d. of his said rent.⁵⁶⁰

Three years after the taking of this inquisition, and in the thirteenth year of his reign, A. D. 1340, king Edward the Third in consideration of the sum of one hundred pounds, which the prior of the Hospital promised to pay him towards the expense of his expedition into France, granted to the said prior all the residue of the Temple then remaining in the king’s hands, to hold, together with the cemetery, cloisters, and the other sanctified places, to the said prior and his brethren, and their successors, of the king and his heirs, for charitable purposes, for ever.⁵⁶¹ From the above grant it appears that the porter of the Temple received sixty shillings and tenpence per annum, and twopence a day wages, which were to be paid him by the Hospitallers.

At this period Philip Thane was prior of the Hospital; and he appears to have exerted himself to impart to the celebration of divine service in the Temple Church, the dignity and the splendour it possessed in the time of the Templars. He, with the unanimous consent and approbation of the whole chapter of the Hospital, granted to Brother Hugh de Lichefeld, priest, and to his successors, guardians of the Temple Church, towards the improvement of the lights and the celebration of divine service therein, all the land called Ficketzfeld, and the garden called Cotterell Garden;⁵⁶² and two years afterwards he made a further grant, to the said Hugh and his successors, of a thousand fagots a year to be cut of the wood of Lilleston, and carried to the New Temple to keep up the fire in the said church.⁵⁶³

King Edward the Third, in the thirty-fifth year of his reign, A. D. 1362, notwithstanding the grant of the Temple to the Hospitallers, exercised the right of appointing to the porter’s office and by his letters patent he promoted Roger Small to that post for the term of his life, in return for the good service rendered him by the said Roger Small.⁵⁶⁴

It is at this period that the first distinct mention of a society of lawyers in the Temple occurs.

The poet Chaucer, who was born at the close of the reign of Edward the Second, A. D. 1327, and was in high favour at court in the reign of Edward the Third, thus speaks of the Manciple, or the purveyor of provisions of the lawyers in the Temple:

 
“A gentil Manciple was there of the Temple,
Of whom achatours mighten take ensemple,
For to ben wise in bying of vitaille.
For whether that he paid or toke by taille,
Algate he waited so in his achate,
That he was aye before in good estate.
Now is not that of God a full fayre grace,
That swiche a lewed mannes wit shal pace,
The wisdome of an hepe of lerned men?”
“Of maisters had he mo than thries ten,
That were of lawe expert and curious:
Of which there was a dosein in that hous
Worthy to ben stewardes of rent and lond
Of any lord that is in Englelond,
To maken him live by his propre good,
In honour detteles, but if he were wood,
Or live as scarsly, as him list desire;
And able for to helpen all a shire,
In any cas that mighte fallen or happe;
And yet this manciple sette hir aller cappe.”⁵⁶⁵
 

It appears, therefore, that the lawyers in the Temple, in the reign of Edward the Third, had their purveyor of provisions as at this day, and were consequently then keeping commons, or dining together in hall.

In the fourth year of the reign of Richard the Second, A. D. 1381, a still more distinct notice occurs of the Temple, as the residence of the learners and the learned in the law.

We are told in an antient chronicle, written in Norman French, formerly belonging to the abbey of St. Mary’s at York, that the rebels under Wat Tyler went to the Temple and pulled down the houses, and entered the church and took all the books and the rolls of remembrances which were in the chests of the LEARNERS OF THE LAW in the Temple, and placed them under the large chimney and burnt them. (“Les rebels alleront a le Temple et jetteront les measons a la terre et avegheront tighles, issint que ils fairont coverture en mal array; et alleront en l’esglise, et pristeront touts les liveres et rolles de remembrances, que furont en leur huches deins le Temple de Apprentices de la Ley; et porteront en le haut chimene et les arderont.”⁵⁶⁶) And Walsingham, who wrote in the reign of Henry the Sixth, about fifty years after the occurrence of these events, tells us that after the rebels, under Wat Tyler and Jack Straw, had burnt the Savoy, the noble palace of John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster, they pulled down the place called Temple Barr, where the apprentices or learners of the highest branch of the profession of the law dwelt, on account of the spite they bore to Robert Hales, Master of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem, and burnt many deeds which the lawyers there had in their custody. (“Quibus perpetratis, satis malitiose etiam locum qui vocatur Temple Barre, in quo apprenticii juris morabantur nobiliores, diruerunt, ob iram quam conceperant contra Robertum de Hales Magistrum Hospitalis Sancti Johannis Jerusalem, ubi plura munimenta, quæ Juridici in custodiâ habuerunt, igne consumpta sunt.”)⁵⁶⁷

In a subsequent passage, however, he gives us a better clue to the attack upon the Temple, and the burning of the deeds and writings, for he tells us that it was the intention of the rebels to decapitate all the lawyers, for they thought that by destroying them they could put an end to the law, and so be enabled to order matters according to their own will and pleasure. (“Ad decollandum omnes juridicos, escaetores, et universos qui vel in lege docti fuere, vel cum jure ratione officii communicavere. Mente nempe conceperant, doctis in lege necatis, universa juxta communis plebis scitum de cætero ordinare, et nullam omnino legem fore futuram, vel si futura foret, esse pro suorum arbitrio statuenda.”)

It is evident that the lawyers were the immediate successors of the Knights Templars in the occupation of the Temple, as the lessees of the earl of Lancaster.

Whilst the Templars were pining in captivity in the dungeons of London and of York, king Edward the Second paid to their servants and retainers the pensions they had previously received from the treasury of the Temple, on condition that they continued to perform the services and duties they had rendered to their antient masters. On the 26th of November, A. D. 1311, he granted to Robert Styfford, clerk, for his maintenance in the house of the Temple at London, two deniers a day, and five shillings a year for necessaries, provided he did service in the church; and when unable to do so, he was to receive only his food and lodging. Geoffrey Talaver was to receive, in the same house of the Temple, three deniers a day for his sustenance, and twenty shillings a year for necessaries, during the remainder of his life; also one denier a day for the support of his boy, and five shillings a year for his wages. Geoffrey de Cave, clerk, and John de Shelton, were also, each of them, to receive from the same house, for their good services, an annual pension of forty shillings for the term of their lives.⁵⁶⁸ Some of these retainers, in addition to their various stipends, were to have a gown of the class of free-serving brethren of the order of the Temple⁵⁶⁹ each year; one old garment out of the stock of old garments belonging to the brethren;⁵⁷⁰ one mark a year for their shoes, &c.; their sons also received so much per diem, on condition that they did the daily work of the house. These retainers were of the class of free servants of office; they held their posts for life, and not being members of the order of the Temple, they were not included in the general proscription of the fraternity. In return for the provision made them by the king, they were to continue to do their customary work as long as they were able.

Now it is worthy of remark, that many of the rules, customs, and usages of the society of Knights Templars are to this day observed in the Temple, naturally leading us to conclude that these domestics and retainers of the antient brotherhood became connected with the legal society formed therein, and transferred their services to that learned body.

From the time of Chaucer to the present day, the lawyers have dined together in the antient hall, as the military monks did before them; and the rule of their order requiring “two and two to eat together,” and “all the fragments to be given in brotherly charity to the domestics,” is observed to this day, and has been in force from time immemorial. The attendants at table, moreover, are still called paniers, as in the days of the Knights Templars.⁵⁷¹ The leading punishments of the Temple, too, remain the same as in the olden time. The antient Templar, for example, for a light fault, was “withdrawn from the companionship of his fellows,” and not allowed “to eat with them at the same table,”⁵⁷² and the modern Templar, for impropriety of conduct, is “expelled the hall” and “put out of commons.” The brethren of the antient fraternity were, for grave offences, in addition to the above punishment, deprived of their lodgings,⁵⁷³ and were compelled to sleep with the beasts in the open court; and the members of the modern fellowship have in bygone times, as a mode of punishment, been temporarily deprived of their chambers in the Temple for misconduct, and padlocks have been put upon the doors. The Master and Chapter of the Temple, in the time of the Knights Templars, exercised the power of imprisonment and expulsion from the fellowship, and the same punishments have been freely used down to a recent period by the Masters of the Bench of the modern societies. Until of late years, too, the modern Templars have had their readers, officers of great dignity, whose duty it has been to read and expound LAW in the hall, at and after meals, in the same way as the readers of the Knights Templars read and expounded RELIGION.