The Elizabethan Parish in its Ecclesiastical and Financial Aspects by Sedley Lynch Ware
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Sedley Lynch Ware >> The Elizabethan Parish in its Ecclesiastical and Financial Aspects
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9 SERIES XXVI NOS. 7-8
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES
IN
HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL SCIENCE
Under the Direction of the Departments of History, Political Economy,
and Political Science
THE ELIZABETHAN PARISH IN ITS ECCLESIASTICAL AND FINANCIAL ASPECTS
BY
SEDLEY LYNCH WARE, A.B., LL.B.
Fellow in History.
PUBLISHED MONTHLY
July-August, 1908
PREFACE
These chapters are but part of a larger work on the Elizabethan parish
designed to cover all the aspects of parish government. There is need
of a comprehensive study of the parish institutions of this period,
owing to the fact that no modern work exists that in any thorough way
pretends to discuss the subject. The work of Toulmin Smith was written
to defend a theory, while the recent history of Mr. and Mrs. Webb
deals in the main with the parish subsequent to the year 1688. The
material already in print for such a study is very voluminous, the
accumulation of texts having progressed more rapidly than the use of
them by scholars.
My subject was suggested to me by Professor Vincent, to whom as well
as to Professor Andrews I am indebted for advice and assistance
throughout this work. In England I have to thank Messrs. Sidney Webb,
Hubert Hall and George Unwin, of the London School of Economics, for
reading manuscript and suggesting improvements. For similar help and
for reference to new material my acknowledgments are due to Mr. C.H.
Firth, Regius Professor of Modern History, Oxford, and to Mr. C.R.L.
Fletcher, of Magdalen College. At the British Museum I found the
officials most courteous, while the librarians of the Peabody
Institute, Baltimore, have given me every aid in their power.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
THE ECCLESIASTICAL GOVERNMENT OF THE PARISH.
ITS IMPORTANCE IN LOCAL GOVERNMENT
ARCHDEACONS' COURTS
ILLUSTRATIONS FROM ACT BOOKS OF JUDICIAL ADMINISTRATION
CHURCHWARDENS' DUTIES
MINISTERS' DUTIES
OBLIGATIONS EXACTED FROM ALL ALIKE
CONTROL OF CHURCH OVER EDUCATION AND OPINION
HOW COURTS CHRISTIAN ENFORCED THEIR DECREES
EFFECTIVENESS OF EXCOMMUNICATION
EVILS AND ABUSES OF THE SYSTEM
JURISDICTION OF QUEEN'S JUDGES IN ECCLESIASTICAL MATTERS
CHAPTER II.
PARISH FINANCE.
ENDOWED PARISHES
EXPEDIENTS FOR RAISING MONEY
CHURCH-ALES, PLAYS, GAMES, ETC
OFFERINGS AND GATHERINGS
COMMUNION DUES
SALE OF SEATS, PEW RENTS
PARISH TARIFFS FOR BURIALS, MARRIAGES, ETC.
INCOME FROM FINES AND MISCELLANEOUS RECEIPTS
RATES AND ASSESSMENTS
INDEPENDENCE OF PARISH AS A FINANCIAL UNIT
SIGNIFICANCE OF THIS IN COUNTY GOVERNMENT
THE ELIZABETHAN PARISH IN ITS ECCLESIASTICAL AND FINANCIAL ASPECTS.
CHAPTER I.
THE ECCLESIASTICAL GOVERNMENT OF THE PARISH.
The ecclesiastical administration of the English parish from the
period of the Reformation down to the outbreak of the great Civil War
is a subject which has been much neglected by historians of local
institutions. Yet during the reign of Elizabeth, at least, the church
courts took as large a share in parish government as did the justices
of the peace. Not only were there many obligations enforced by the
ordinaries which today would be purely civil in character, but to
contemporaries the maintenance of the church fabric and furniture
appeared every whit as important as the repairing of roads and
bridges; while the obligation to attend church and receive communion
was on a par with that to attend musters, but with this difference,
that the former requirement affected all alike, while the latter
applied to comparatively few of the parishioners.
In the theory of the times, indeed, every member of the commonwealth
was also a member of the Church of England, and conversely. Allegiance
to both was, according to the simile of the Elizabethan divine, in its
nature as indistinguishable as are the sides of a triangle, of which
any line indifferently may form a side or a base according to the
angle of approach of the observer[1]. The Queen was head of the
commonwealth ecclesiastical as well as of the commonwealth civil, and
as well apprized of her spiritual as of her temporal judges[2]. For
both sets of judges equally Parliament legislated, or sanctioned
legislation. Sometimes, in fact, it became a mere matter of expediency
whether a court Christian or a common law tribunal should be charged
with the enforcement of legislation on parochial matters. Thus the
provisions of the Rubric of the Book of Common Prayer were enforced by
the justices as well as by the ordinaries. Again, secular and
ecclesiastical judges had concurrent jurisdiction over church
attendance, and--at any rate between 1572 and 1597[3]--over the care
of the parish poor. Finally, it must not be supposed that the men who
actually sat as judges in the archdeacon's or the bishop's court were
necessarily in orders. In point of fact a large proportion, perhaps a
large majority of them, were laymen, since the act of Henry VIII in
1545 permitted married civilians to exercise ecclesiastical
jurisdiction.[4]
In the treatment of our subject the plan we shall follow is, first, to
make some preliminary observations as to the times, places and modes
of holding the church courts; second, with the aid of illustrations
drawn from the act-books of these courts, to show how their judicial
administration was exercised over the parish, either through the
medium of the parish officers or directly upon the parishioners
themselves; third, to analyze the means at the command of the
ecclesiastical judges to enforce their decrees; and, finally, to point
out that from its very nature the exercise of spiritual jurisdiction
was liable to abuses, and must at all times have proved unpopular.
Speaking generally (for the jurisdictions called "peculiars" formed
exceptions), England was divided for the purposes of local
ecclesiastical administration and discipline into archdeaconries, each
comprising a varying number of parishes. Twice a year as a rule the
archdeacon, or his official in his place, held a visitation or kept a
general court (the two terms being synonymous) in the church of some
market town--not always the same--of the archdeaconry. The usual times
for these visitations were Easter and Michaelmas. The bishops also
commonly held visitations in person, or by vicars-general or
chancellors, once every third year throughout their dioceses. Yet at
the semiannual visitations of the archdeacon as well as at the
triennial visitations of the bishop, the mode of procedure, the class
of offences, the parish officers summoned, the discipline
exercised--all were the same, the bishop's court being simply
substituted for the time being for that of the archdeacon.
There were other visitations: those of the Queen's High Commissioners,
and those of the Metropolitan. There were a very great number of other
courts, but for the purposes of the every-day ecclesiastical
governance of the parish the two classes of courts or visitations
above mentioned are all that need concern us. It is, however,
important to state, that while churchwardens and sidemen were
_compelled_ to attend the two general courts of the archdeacon (and of
course the bishop's court) and to write out on each occasion formal
lists of offenders and offences ("presentments" or "detections") these
parish officers might also at any time make _voluntary_ presentments
to the archdeacons. Those functionaries, in fact, seem to have held
sittings for the transaction of current business, or of matters which
could not be terminated at the visitation, every month, or even every
three weeks. Others may have sat (as we should say of a common-law
judge) in chambers.[5] Before each general visitation an apparitor or
summoner of the court went about and gave warning to the churchwardens
of some half-dozen parishes, more or less, to be in attendance with
other parish officers on a day fixed in some church centrally located
in respect of the parishes selected for that day's visitation.
The church of each parish was, indeed, not only its place for worship,
but also the seat and centre for the transaction of all business
concerning the parish. In it, according to law, the minister had to
read aloud from time to time articles of inquiry founded on the
Queen's or the diocesan's injunctions, and to admonish wardens and
sidemen to present offences under these articles at the next
visitation.[6] In it also he gave monition for the annual choice of
collectors for the poor;[7] warning for the yearly perambulation of
the parish bounds;[8] and public announcement of the six certain days
on which each year every parishioner had to attend in person or send
wain and men for the repair of highways.[9] In the parish church also
proclamation had to be made of estrays before the beasts could be
legally seized and impounded.[10] Here, too, school-masters often
taught their pupils[11]--unless, indeed, the parish possessed a
separate school-house. Here, in the vestry, the parish armor was
frequently kept, and sometimes the parish powder barrels were
deposited;[12] here too, occasionally, country parsons stored their
wool or grain.[13]
Finally, in the parish church assembled vestries for the holding of
accounts, the making of rates and the election of officers. Overseers
of the poor held their monthly meetings here. Occasionally the
neighboring justices of the peace met here to take the overseers'
accounts or to transact other business;[14] and in the church also
might be held coroners' inquests over dead bodies.[15] Last, but not
least in importance, in the churches of the market towns the
archdeacon made his visitations and held his court; and on these
occasions the sacred edifice rang with the unseemly squabbles of the
proctors, the accusations of the wardens and sidemen or of the
apparitor, and the recriminations of the accused--in short, the church
was turned for the time being into a moral police court, where all the
parish scandal was carefully gone over and ventilated.[16]
The ecclesiastical courts carried on their judicial administration of
the parish largely, of course, through the medium of the officers of
the parish. These were the churchwardens, the sidemen and the
incumbent, whether rector, vicar or curate.[17]
First in importance were the churchwardens. Though legislation
throughout the time of Elizabeth was ever adding to their functions
duties purely civil in their nature, and though they themselves were
more and more subjected to the control of the justices of the peace,
nevertheless it is true to say that to the end of the reign the office
of churchwarden is one mainly appertaining to the jurisdiction and
supervision of the courts Christian.
The doctrine of the courts that churchwardens were merely civil
officers belongs to a later period.[18]
After a churchwarden had been chosen or elected, he took the oath of
office before the archdeacon. In this he swore to observe the Queen's
and the bishop's injunctions, and to cause others to observe them; to
present violators of the same to the sworn men (or sidemen), or to the
ordinary's chancellor or official, or to the Queen's high
commissioners; finally, he swore to yield up a faithful accounting to
the parish of all sums that had passed through his hands during his
term of office.[19]
Before each visitation day, as has been said, the archdeacon's or the
bishop's summoner went to each parish and gave warning that a court
would be held in such and such a church on such and such a day.
Pending that day wardens and sidemen drew up their bills of
presentment. These bills were definite answers to a series of articles
of inquiry founded on the diocesan's injunctions, themselves based on
the Queen's Injunctions of 1559 and on the Canons.[20] Failure to
present offences was promptly punished by the judge.[21] Failure to
attend court when duly warned was no less promptly followed by
excommunication, and then it was an expensive matter for the wardens
to get out of the official's book again.[22] But of fees and fines
more hereafter.
Among the churchwardens' principal obligations, as laid down in the
injunctions and articles they were sworn to observe, was the keeping
in repair of the church fabric and its appurtenances, as well as the
procuring and the maintaining in good condition of the church
"furniture," a term which in the language of the time included all the
necessaries for worship and the celebration of the sacraments: church
linen, surplices, the communion cup, the elements themselves, bibles,
prayer books, the writings of authorized commentators on the
Scriptures, or the works of apologists for the Anglican Church; tables
of consanguinity and other official documents enjoined to be kept in
every parish by the diocesan.[23]
The visitation act-books of the period abundantly show the processes
employed by the ecclesiastical authorities in enforcing these and
other duties (which will be detailed in their turn), and prove that
the courts Christian were emphatically administrative as well as
judicial bodies. To show these courts at work it will be necessary to
give a number of illustrative examples taken from the visitation
entries. Thus the wardens of Childwall, having been presented at the
visitation of the bishop of Chester, 9th October, 1592, because their
church "wanteth reparac[i]on," are excommunicated for not appearing.
On a subsequent day John Whittle, who represents the wardens, informs
the court that the repairs have been executed. Thereupon the wardens
are absolved and the registrar erases the word "excommunicated" from
the act-book.[24] At the same visitation the wardens of Aughton are
presented because "there bible is not sufficient, they want the first
tome of the homilies, Mr. Juells Replie and Apologie[25] [etc.]...."
The two wardens are enjoined by the judge to buy a sufficient bible
and to certify to him that they have done so.
But--so careful is the supervision over parish affairs--mere
certification by vicar or wardens that a certain article has been
procured in obedience to a court order will not always suffice. If the
thing can be produced in court the judge often orders it to be brought
before him for personal inspection. Accordingly, when at the
visitation of the chancellor of the bishop of Durham, the 13th March,
1578/1579, the wardens of Coniscliffe are found to "lacke 2 Salter
bookes [and] one booke of the Homelies," they are admonished to
certify "that they have the books detected 4th April and to bringe
their boks hither."[26] Thus, too, the wardens of St. Michael's,
Bishop Stortford, record in 1585 that they have paid 8d. "when we
brought in to the court the byble and comunion booke to shewe before
the comysary."[27] There is a curious entry in the same accounts some
years earlier, viz.: "pd for showing [shoeing] of an horse when mr
Jardfield went to london to se wether it was our byble that was lost
or no and for his charges...."[28]
At the visitation held at Romford Chapel, Essex Archdeaconry, 5th
September, 1578, the wardens of Dengie "broughte in theire surplice,
which surplice is torne & verie indecent & uncomly, as appereth;
whereupon the judge, for that theie neglected their othes, [ordered
them to confess their fault and prepare] a newe surplice of holland
cloth of v s. thele [the ell], conteyninge viii elles, _citra festum
animarum prox_." Remembering that money was then worth ten to twelve
times what it is today, this was probably considered too great a
burden by the parishioners of Dengie. A petition must have been
presented to be allowed to procure a cheaper surplice, for on the 6th
October following the wardens were permitted to prepare a surplice
containing six ells only at the reduced price of 2s. 8d. per ell.[29]
It seems to have been the practice in the Dean of York's Peculiar for
the judge to threaten the churchwardens occasionally with a fine for
failure to repair their church or supply missing requisites for
service by a fixed day. Thus at Dean Matthew Hutton's visitation,
July, 1568, the churchyards of Hayton and of Belby were found to be
insufficiently fenced. The order of the court was: "_Habent ad
reparanda premissa citra festum sancti Michaelis proximum sub pena XX
s_."[30]
So, too, the Thornton wardens at the same visitation are warned to
repair the body of their church "betwixt this and Michlmes next upon
paine of X s."[31] But as spiritual tribunals had no legal power to
fine[32] or to imprison, apparently the usual penalty prescribed by
the judges in case of disobedience to, or neglect of, their orders to
repair or replace by a certain day, was, in the words of Bishop Barnes
addressed to the churchwardens in Durham diocese, the "paynes of
interdiction and suspencion [_i.e._, temporary excommunication] to be
pronounced against themselves."[33] Yet here, too, the wardens did not
escape indirect amercement, for absolution from interdiction or
excommunication often meant a payment of various court fees, which in
many cases were by no means light. These fines the wardens put to
their credit in the expense items of their accounts if they could
possibly do so, and it is probable that the parish always paid them
except in cases of very gross individual delinquency in office. Thus
the wardens of St. Martin's, Leicester, record: "Payd to Mr.
Comyssarye whe[n] we was suspendyd for Lackynge a Byble & to hys
offycers xxiij d."[34] The wardens of Melton Mowbray register: "Ffor
our chargs & marsements at Lecest[e]r ... for yt ye Rood loft whas not
takyn down & deafasyed iiij s. iiij d."[35]
In the same accounts we find some years later: "Payde to ... at the
vicitacion houlden at Melton for dismissinge us oute of there bookes
for not reparinge the churche iij s. ij d."[36] So, also, we read in
the St. Ethelburga-within-Bishopsgate Accounts: "Paid in D[octor]
Stanhope's courte beinge p[re]sented by p[ar]son Bull aboute the
glasse windowes xvj d." And nine years later: "Paid for Mr Gannett and
myselfe ['Humfery Jeames'] for absolution iiij s. viij d." Also: "Paid
for our discharge at the courte for [from] our excomm[uni]cacon xvj
d."[37]
The act-books abundantly show that ecclesiastical courts were very far
from being limited to mere moral suasion or to spiritual censures.
They could never have accomplished their work so thoroughly if they
had been. This point will be brought out much more clearly, it is
hoped, when we come to consider excommunication as a weapon of
coercion.[38] The courts fined parishioners individually[39] and they
fined them collectively. What matters it that these fines were called
court fees, absolution fees, commutation of penance, or by any other
name? What signifies it that the proceeds could be applied only _in
pios usus_? The mulcting was none the less real. On the score of
bringing stubborn or careless wardens to terms through their purses,
the following extract from a letter written in 1572 to the official of
the archdeacon of the bishop of London is in point. The letter informs
the judge that Jasper Anderkyn, a churchwarden, "hathe done nothing of
that which he was apoinnted by your worshipp at Mydsomer to do, for
the churche yarde lyeth to commons and all other thynkes in the
churche is ondonne.... I praye you dele w[i]t[h] hym so yt he maye be
a presydent for them that shall have the offyce; for they wyll but
jess att itt, and saye it is butt a mony matter: therefore lett them
paye well for the penaltie whiche was sett on theire heads."
Continuing, the writer states that his reason for writing is "that you
be not abewseid in youre office by there muche intreatyng for
themselffes, for Jesper Anderkyn stands excommunicated."[40]
Sometimes for failure to perform the ordinary's[41] injunctions a
whole parish was excommunicated or a church interdicted.[42] Thus in
the Abbey Parish Church[43] Accounts we read under the year 1592 how
troublesome and how costly it was "when the church was interdicted" to
ride to Lichfield and there tarry several days seeking absolution. For
this 20 shillings was paid, a very large sum for the time, not to
mention a fee to the summoner, travelling expenses and the writing of
letters on the parish's behalf.[44] The wardens of Stratton, Cornwall,
had a similar experience "when the churche wardyns & the hole
p[ar]ysch was exco[mu]nycatt" in 1565. Among the expense items
relating to that occasion is a significant one: "ffor wyne & goodchere
ffor the buschuppe ys s[er]vantt[s] ij s. viij d."[45]
So close is the supervision of the ordinary over the churchwardens, so
effective the discipline of the church courts, that we seem to hear
occasionally a sort of dialogue going on between judges and wardens,
the former directing certain things to be executed, the latter
replying and reporting from time to time that progress is being made
on the work to be performed, or that the missing objects will be soon
supplied. Accordingly, at the archdeacon of Canterbury's visitation in
1595, we find the wardens of St. John in Thanet (Margate) reporting:
"The chancel[46] is out of repairs, for the repairing whereof some
things are provided."[47] Two years later they state to the court:
"For repairing of the churchyard we desire a day."[48] At the same
visitation the wardens of St. Lawrence in Thanet (Ramsgate) present:
"Our Church is repaired, saving that some glass by reason of the last
wind be broken, the which are [sic] shortly to be amended."[49]
As a final illustration on this score may be adduced the report of the
conscientious wardens of Kilham, Yorkshire, who certify to the judge
of that peculiar, August, 1602, "that there churche walles ar in suche
repaire as heretofore they have beyne. But not in suche sufficient
repaire as is required by the Article[50] for that effect ministred
vnto us."[51]
But the upkeep of the church and its requisites[52] was only one of
the churchwardens' many tasks. They had to look to it that the people
attended church regularly; that the victuallers and ale-houses
received no one while service was being held or a sermon was preached;
that each person was seated in his or her proper place, that each
conducted himself with decorum and remained throughout the service.
Accordingly the act-books tell their interesting story of ministers on
beginning service sending wardens and sidemen abroad to command men to
come to church. The churchwardens and their allies have all sorts of
experiences: they break in upon "exercises" or conventicles;[53] they
peep in at victuallers' houses or at inns where irate hosts slam doors
in their faces and give them bad words on being caught offending;[54]
they come across merrymakers dancing the morris-dance on the village
green during Sunday afternoon service,[55] or they surprise men at a
quiet game of cards at a neighbor's house during evening prayer.[56]
When admonished by the wardens to enter church, some merely gave
contemptuous replies, such as "what prates thou?";[57] others, when
the wardens approached, took to their heels and ran away.[58] Once
inside the church the wardens' task was by no means ended. They had
the care of placing each one in his or her seat according to
degree;[59] according to sex;[60] and, in case of women, according as
they were old or young, married or unmarried.[61] Finally, as has been
said, the wardens were expected to keep watch lest some one slip out
before the service was over or the sermon ended.[62]
But while they have one eye on the congregation lest they offend,
wardens and sidemen must keep another on the minister while service
proceeds or the sacraments are administered, in order that the rites
be duly observed and the Rubric followed. The curate of Theydon Gernon
(Essex) is presented by wardens and sidemen "_quia non fecit suam
diligentiam in dicendo preces_, viz. the communion and Litany";[63]
while the rector of East Hanningfield in the same archdeaconry is not
only complained of to the ordinary for not maintaining the book of
articles, and not using the cross in baptism, but he is also indicted
on the same occasion for not praying for the Queen "accordinge to hir
injunctions, viz. he leaveth out of hir stile the kingdome of
Fraunce."[64] The court's order was that the rector should acknowledge
his error on the following Sunday "_coram gardianis_." The wardens of
Wilton, Yorkshire, report to the commissary of the Dean of York that
their curate recites divine service "very orderlie," but not at a fit
time, for he holds service at eight in the morning and two in the
afternoon.[65] Finally, the rector of Pitsea is complained against to
the archdeacon of Essex for "that he is unsufficient to serve the cure
ine that theie are not edified by him...."[66]
If the parson neglected his duties it was incumbent upon the wardens
to exhort him to perform them.[67] When at the visitation of the
bishop of Chester in 1592 it was found that there was no surplice at
Bolton Church, Manchester Deanery, not only did the judge admonish one
of the Bolton wardens to buy the surplice, but he was instructed "to
offer hit to thee Vicar at the time of ministering the sacraments, and
to certify of his wearing or refusing of hit before the Feast of the
Nativity of our Lord next."[68]
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