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204 V. THE REFORMATION (A.D. 15201592).
together a Church Council at Orebro (February 2nd-7th,
1529), which consisted only of spiritual persons, of whom
about forty attended. Three bishops, Magnus of Skara,
Magnus of Strengnas and Peter of Vesteras, were there, but
Laurentius Andreae presided in place of the archbishop.
We have no account of details, but we know its decisions,
which are very important as evidences of the slow and
cautious process of change in Sweden. The king s motto
was: "Instruct first: reform afterwards." The first re
solution was on preaching and teaching, the second on
Church discipline, the third on ceremonies. Under the
first head bishops were instructed to overlook the preach
ing of God s pure Word "as it is comprehended in the
Scripture." In cathedrals there was to be a daily lesson
of Holy Scripture, with a good explanation of it, which
was to be attended by country clergy. The lower clergy of
the cathedrals were also to attend. The town clergy were
to be learned and to help to teach their brethren in the
country, and to be ready to go out and preach for them.
The old rule about repeating the Lord s Prayer, Creed,
Ave Maria, and the Ten Commandments was renewed.
The Ave Maria was, as I have said, in the same Biblical
form as in England, not in the later Franciscan and present
Roman form, which only crept in by degrees about this
period into Southern Europe.
11
As to discipline, scholars were forbidden to go about the
country to collect alms a re-enactment of a previous canon.
The second article said:
"
As the law of the pope forbids
some to enter into marriage whom God has not forbidden,
it is determined to dispense with this law for honest rea
sons, provided scandal be avoided as far as possible."
This was evidently a way of quietly repealing the law of
celibacy as binding on the clergy, and probably all the
prohibitions of marriage within the degrees of kindred or
affinity, except those directly contained in Leviticus, or
11
See my lecture, The Invocation of Saints, and Article
XXII. , 2, S.P.C.K., 1908. It does not appear in any
Breviary before 1509, and then at Paris.
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