Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Norris, Philip
NORRIS, PHILIP (d. 1465), dean of St. Patrick's, Dublin, was probably born at Dundalk. When quite young, on 29 July 1427, he was presented to the vicarage of St. Nicholas, Dundalk. Shortly after he obtained leave of absence for seven years in order to complete his studies at Oxford. Entering at University College, he studied for a time in ‘the great hall’ of that college, and later, during 1429 and two following years, he presided over ‘the little hall’ until he obtained the degree of doctor of divinity. He is said to have acquired a good knowledge of philosophy and theology, and to have been learned in canon and civil law and proficient in rhetoric. While at Oxford he adopted very decided opinions regarding the misconduct and abuses of the mendicant orders of friars, and became a strenuous advocate for their reform or suppression. His opinions on this subject were similar to those promulgated during the previous century by Richard Fitzralph [q. v.] Norris in his sermons and writings sharply attacked the habits of these orders, and maintained that it was scandalous for a priest to beg. The friars were not slow in retorting. Thomas Hore, a Dominican, made a complaint against him, in the name of the four orders, to Pope Eugenius IV, who directed Dominic, cardinal-deacon of St. Mary's, Rome, to make inquiry into the matter, and report to him in secret consistory. This was done, and the statements of Norris were condemned as heretical and erroneous by a bull issued in 1440. He was also censured, and declared to be incapable of holding any church benefice. Norris appealed from the pope's decision to the council of Basle, and the bull does not seem to have been enforced. Bale says he was protected by several archbishops. His opponents, however, not only complained to the pope, but also to Henry VI. They alleged that Thomas Walsh, bachelor of laws, had obstructed Richard Talbot [q. v.], archbishop of Dublin, and prevented him from reading and promulgating certain bulls issued on their behalf against Norris. Legal inquiry followed, and Walsh was declared to be innocent of the charge. William Musselwyke, an Augustin friar, who made a further complaint at Rome against Norris in the name of his order, was, with his abettors, suspended by the chancellor of Oxford for having submitted a cause to be tried abroad that came within the jurisdiction of the university court. Norris was thus able to set at defiance both the friars and the pope's bull. But in 1458 Nicholas V addressed another bull concerning him to the Archbishops of Canterbury, London, and Dublin, further accusing him of contumacy, and declaring that if he continued in his errors he should be excommunicated, handed over to the civil authority, and kept in custody until he recanted and had paid the expenses of the proceedings undertaken against him. This bull seems also to have remained in abeyance. Norris, having, however, exceeded his term of seven years' absence from his benefice, was proceeded against under the statute of Richard II regarding Irish absentees. The profit of his benefice at Dundalk was distrained by order of the court of exchequer, and two-thirds of it forfeited to the crown. On his return to Ireland he was made prebendary at Yago (St. Jago), in the county of Kildare, and in 1457 dean of St. Patrick's, Dublin. For about seven years previous to his death in 1465 his health was very precarious, and he was incapable of making his will. He is credited with the authorship of 1. ‘Declamationes quædam.’ 2. ‘Lecturæ Scripturarum.’ 3. ‘Contra Mendicitatem Validam,’ none of which are known to be extant.
[Tanner's Bibl. Brit.-Hib.; Wood's Hist. Oxon. ii. 62; Wadding's Annales Minorum, xi. 104, xii. 8; Monck Mason's Hist. Annals of the Collegiate Church and Cathedral of St. Patrick, Dublin, 1820.]