Up to this time the word _religious_ had been applied only to
such as were inmates of a cloister. Now the truth dawned upon men
that it was possible to live the higher life even while pursuing
one's ordinary vocation in the busy world. The tone of social
morality must have gained enormously by the dissemination of this new
doctrine, and its acceptance among high and low. It became the
fashion in the upper classes to enrol oneself among the Tertiaries,
and every new enrolment was an important accession to the stability,
and, indeed, to the material resources of the Minorites; and when,
apparently within a few days of one another--no less than five
gentlemen of knightly rank, of whom at least one, Sir Giles de Merc,
had only recently been employed as an envoy by the king to his
brother Richard in Gascony, and another, Sir Henry de Walpole, was
amongst the most considerable and wealthy men in the eastern
counties, Henry the Third spoke out his mind and showed that he was
not too well-pleased. Really these friars were going on too fast--
turning men's heads! At Lynn the Franciscans were specially fortunate
in their warden, whose austerity of life, gentle manners, and
profoundly sympathetic temperament obtained for him unbounded
influence. Among others Alexander de Bassingbourne [Footnote: The
name is again changed into _Bissing_burne by Eccleston, who
writes it as he heard it from Norfolk people.
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