"Woe is me! Woe is me!" he
burst forth: "the simple brethren are entering heaven, and the learned
ones are debating if there be one"; and he sent at once a sum of L10
sterling to the Court to buy a copy of the Decretals, that the Friars
might study them and give over their frivolities.' The great difficulty
was to prevent the brethren from studying the doctrine of Aristotle, as
it was to be found in vile Latin translations, instead of attending to
Grostete, who was said to know 'a hundred thousand times more than
Aristotle' on all his subjects. Grostete himself spent very large sums
in importing Greek books. In this he was helped by John Basingstoke, who
had himself studied at Athens, and who taught the Greek language to
several of the monks at St. Alban's. Grostete upheld the eastern
doctrines against the teaching of the Papal Court, and indeed was
nicknamed 'the hammerer of the Romans.' He based many of his statements
upon books which he valued as his choicest possessions; but some of them,
such as the _Testament of the Patriarchs_ and the _Decretals of
Dionysius_ are now admitted to be forgeries. On Grostete's death in 1253
he bequeathed his library, rich in marginal commentaries and annotations,
to the Friars for whom he had worked before he became Bishop and
Chancellor. Some generations afterwards their successors sold many of the
books to Dr. Gascoigne, who used to work on them at the Minorites'
Library: and some of those which he bought found their way to the
libraries of Balliol, Oriel, and Lincoln; the main body of Grostete's
books was gradually dispersed by gifts and sales, and dwindled down to
little or nothing; so that, when Leland paid his official visit after the
suppression of the monasteries, he found very few books of any kind, but
plenty of dust and cobwebs, 'and moths and beetles swarming over the
empty shelves.
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