only by the personal intervention of the king that the bill for the
suppression of the lesser monasteries was allowed to pass, and that it
is at least doubtful if any but general statements founded on the
/Comperta/ were brought before Parliament. The story of the production
of the "Black Book" supposed to contain the reports is of a much later
date, and comes from sources that could not be regarded as
unprejudiced. It had its origin probably in a misunderstanding of the
nature of the /Compendium Compertorum/, which dealt only with parishes
of the northern province. It is strange that though the commissioners
made no distinction between the condition of the larger and the
smaller monasteries, the Act of Parliament based upon these reports
decreed only the suppression of the smaller monasteries, as if vice
and neglect of discipline were more likely to reign in the small
rather than in the larger communities; and it is equally strange that
the superiors of many of the houses, about which unfavourable reports
had been presented, were promoted to high ecclesiastical offices by
the king and by his vicar-general, who should have been convinced of
the guilt and unworthiness of such ministers, had they trusted their
own commissioners. In the case of some of the dioceses, as for example
Norwich, it is possible to compare the results of an episcopal
visitation held some years previously with the reports of Cromwell's
commissioners, and though it is sufficiently clear from these earlier
reports that all was not well with discipline, the discrepancy between
the accounts of the bishops and the royal commissioners is so
striking, that it is difficult to believe that the houses could have
degenerated so rapidly in so short a space of time as to justify the
/Comperta/ of the commissioners. But what is still more striking is
the fact that after the decree of suppression had gone forth, other
commissioners, drawn largely from the local gentry, many of whom were
to share in the plunder of the monastic lands, visited several of the