The House of the Salutation of the Mother of God at Smithfield does not appear to have been distinguished from its sisters during the fifteenth century by any superior degree of fervour. Like them, however, it had preserved intact the essentials of the Carthusian way of life, and thus provides a striking example of the reward that comes to a body of men, perhaps of no remarkable virtue, who are faithful to the prescriptions of their Rule: the coals remain alight and, though dull, may be kindled to flame by a breath of the Spirit. The London Charterhouse was to give to English monastic history one of its brightest pages, and it is possible for us to see that the heroism of so many of its sons in the hour of flood and whirlwind was no sudden impulse or unpredictable accident, but the native resistance of a fabric not built upon the sand. We are fortunate in being able to assemble, from various sources, materials which, if far from complete, are yet sufficient to enable us to reconstruct in its main lines the story of the last years.

Among these sources one is, for better or worse, pre-eminent. The brief history of the last years of the London house, composed by one who had been a member of the family, stands alone among the documents of the time as supplying a picture drawn by a contemporary of the intimate life of a religious community immediately before the Dissolution.