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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Parish opinion was further sought to be moulded by the reading in
church of various tracts, homilies, monitions, forms of special
prayers, etc., etc., which the wardens were ordered to procure from
time to time, and which are very often met with in their accounts.
These official mediums of information or edification conveyed to the
good people of the parishes some knowledge of the events and politics
of the realm and of the world beyond it. Thus they heard of the
overthrow of the rebels in the North of England (1569), the ravages of
the great earthquake of 1579; the progress of the plague; or, again,
of the struggle of the French Protestants led by Henry of Navarre, the
defeat of the Turks at Lepanto, and so forth.[160]
As food for the more advanced minds of the congregations, ordinaries
saw to it that volumes dealing with the interpretation of the
Scriptures, the polity of Church and State, and the defence of that
polity were provided for every parish church. Such works were Erasmus'
Paraphrases, Bullinger's Decades, Bishop Jewel's works, and other
writings of an apologetic nature. To a certain extent news was also
spread, and grievances were aired, in unofficial broadsides or
ballads. These treated of such subjects as the untimely end of
traitors great or small; the adventures of her Majesty's soldiers and
sailors; the rapacity of landlords and the evils of the enclosure
movement.[161]
But these publications and all other printed matter were subject to
the strict censorship of Church and State. Extremely few presses were
permitted in England, and these few under the jealous supervision of
the high ecclesiastical authorities, as is evidenced by the numerous
orders or decrees issued by them to the Master and Wardens of the
London Stationers Company, which, with a very few special patentees,
enjoyed the monopoly of printing.[162]
Having now reviewed the chief administrative functions of the
spiritual courts and their mode of exercise, the question presents
itself, What were the means at the disposal of the ordinaries for
enforcing their decrees? The principal one of these has already been
mentioned incidentally, viz., excommunication. Excommunication was the
most usual, as it was by far the most effective, weapon for compelling
obedience to the mandate of the judge in any matter whatever. Indeed
without this instrument of coercion the ecclesiastical judges would
have been impotent.
Excommunication was of two kinds, the lesser and the greater. The
former was in constant use (to employ the words of a contemporary
document) "for manifest and wilful contumacy or disobedience in not
appearing when ... summoned for a cause ecclesiastical, or when any
sentence or decree of the bishop or his officer, being deliberately
made, was wilfully disobeyed...."[163] Even under the lesser
excommunication a man could not attend service, and he was deprived of
the use of the sacraments.[164] If an excommunicate sought to enter
church with the congregation, either he had to be forcibly expelled or
the service could not proceed.[165] If he continued in his contempt of
court he made himself liable to the greater excommunication,[166] and
then he was virtually an outcast from the society of his fellow
parishioners.[167] That excommunication was feared by the great
majority of parish folk there is no reason to doubt. Certainly the
greater excommunication might seriously injure a man in his business
as well as his social interests, not to mention the trouble and
expense of getting an absolution.[168] That excommunication reduced
most offenders to order the church court proceedings demonstrate. If,
however, a man were obdurate and hardened he was turned over to the
Queen's High Commissioners, and these, while making the fullest use of
ecclesiastical procedure and the oath _ex officio_,[169] also freely
employed the penalties of the temporal courts, viz., fines and
imprisonments. As no ecclesiastical offence was too small for the
Commissioners to deal with, and as their jurisdiction was not limited
(like that of the ordinaries) to a district or a diocese, courts of
High Commission may be called universal ordinaries.[170] Finally, if a
person stood excommunicate over forty days, an ecclesiastical judge,
on application to the diocesan, might procure against him out of
Chancery the writ _De excommunicato capiendo_. This writ was probably
not very often resorted to in practice, partly because of the great
expense involved, and partly perhaps, too, because of the slack
execution of the writ by certain undersheriffs or bailiffs, encouraged
as they were by the rather hostile attitude sometimes assumed against
the courts Christian by the Queen's temporal judges.[171] The writ
was, however, certainly no dead letter, and served also _in terrorem_
to reduce stubborn offenders.[172] Indeed Archbishop Bancroft in 1605
called it "the chiefest temporal strength of ecclesiastical
jurisdiction."[173]
In view of the fact that "standing excommunicate" was in itself a
presentable offence before the ordinary, and an offence often
presented,[174] and in view of the further fact that the excommunicate
might, according to a contemporary who writes with authority, "be
punished for absence from diuine praier, neither shall his
excommunication excuse him, for it is in his owne default,"[175] it is
queried whether such an involuntary absentee from church did not make
himself just as liable to presentment at quarter sessions for
recusancy[176] as any voluntary recusant. Perhaps it is for this
reason that grand juries are sometimes complained of for
discriminating among the names sent in to them on the bishops'
certificates for indictment at quarter sessions, and for certifying
some and throwing out others "at their pleasure."[177]
But be this as it may--and it is conjecture unsupported by positive
proof--enough has been said, it is hoped, to show that ordinaries were
quite capable of making their decrees obeyed, and that excommunication
(contrary to the commonly received opinion) was a most effective means
of coercion. Many, indeed, were its uses. It might (or its equivalent
interdiction or suspension[178]), as has been seen,[179] be used to
compel a parish officer to perform the duties of his office. It might
also be employed, when persuasion failed, to induce a parishioner to
accept office when chosen by his fellows.[180] But, it would seem, one
single definition would comprise all cases: excommunication was
employed against all those who disobeyed some order of the spiritual
judge, express or implied--it was a summary process for contempt of
court, in fact, and was daily used as such.
To recapitulate: a very large part of the parishioner's life and
activity fell under the surveillance and regulation of the
ecclesiastical courts. They compelled him to attend on specified days
his parish church, and no other; to be married there; to have his
children baptized and his wife churched there; to receive a certain
number of times communion there; to contribute to the maintenance of
church and churchyard, as well as to the finding of the requisites for
service or the church ornaments or utensils. In his parish church he
and his children were catechized and instructed, and, if the latter
were taught in a neighboring school-house, it was under the strict
supervision of the ordinary and by his or the bishop's licence and
allowance. So true was this that the schoolmaster was, like the
parson, a church officer. For the parishioner his church was the place
of business where all local affairs, civil or ecclesiastical, were
transacted, as well as the centre of social life in the village. Here
the mandates of the authorities in Church and State were read to him;
here he was admonished of his duty to contribute to, or to perform,
the burdens of parish administration and warned of the penalties for
neglect; here he met with his fellows to settle parish affairs and
audit parish accounts, or to choose parish officers under the auspices
of the ordinary, being himself compelled, if necessary, by that
official to serve when his own turn for office came round. As
churchwarden it was his duty to collect the rents from parish lands
and tenements, and to see that parish offerings were gathered and the
parish rates assessed and paid, or recovered by means of the
ecclesiastical courts. If the church was ruinous; if bread and wine
were lacking for the communion; if any of the books, furniture,
utensils or ornaments enjoined by the diocesan's articles or by the
canons were missing; if the curate did not follow the Rubric, or
retained "superstitious" rites; if the yearly perambulation was
omitted; if faults of the minister or of the parishioners were not
presented: he and his fellow-warden were held responsible by the
official.
The machinery which the canon and the civil law placed at the disposal
of the ordinary for his judicial administration of the parish was
extraordinarily flexible. Courts Christian were unencumbered by the
formalities of the common law or by the cooeperation of juries. They
could proceed _ex officio, i.e_., without formal presentment and upon
hearsay only, and they were armed with the formidable power of
administering the oath _ex officio_ by which a parishioner was forced
to disclose all he knew against himself. They could in all cases
command the _doing_, as well as the _giving_[181] of a thing--powers
far more extensive than those possessed by any court of equity of
today. Lastly, it was their custom to require that a return be made in
court, or in other words, a certification, that their commands had
been duly performed--thus stamping them as true administrative bodies.
It was inevitable from the nature of their jurisdiction and procedure
that abuses should be committed both by ecclesiastical judges and by
their officers, such as registrars, proctors and apparitors. These
judges wielded an admirable instrument of administration and
discipline, one that could be bent to meet any emergency, but this
efficiency had been attained at the sacrifice of some indispensable
safeguards for the carrying out of impartial justice. First, no
parishioner's acts, whether done in an official or a private capacity,
were ever quite safe from misrepresentation, or downright
falsification by his enemies, for secret denunciation to wardens or
sidemen (or to the ordinary himself) by any one[182] might start a
proceeding against the person denounced and force him upon oath to
disclose the most private, the most confidential, matters. Again,
proctors, apparitors, registrars, and other scribes whose fees
depended on citations and the drawing up of court proceedings,
documents, or certificates, had every interest in haling persons
before the official, because court fees had to be paid whether a man
were found innocent or guilty.[183] Hence the system tended to create
spies, of whom the chief were the apparitors, or summoners, and their
underlings. There is a very interesting contemporary ballad entitled
_"A new Ballad of the Parrator and the Divell_," attributed by its
modern editor to not later than 1616, which throws much light on the
proceedings of certain unscrupulous apparitors, and reflects also the
strong dislike entertained for the whole tribe of apparitors by people
of the time.[184] The devil going a hunting one Sunday and beating the
bushes, up starts a proud apparitor. During several stanzas the
apparitor narrates to the devil, as one consummately wicked man to
another, all the tricks of his trade to drum up cases for himself and
his court. He spies on lovers as they pass unsuspecting; he haunts the
ale-houses and overhears men's tales over their cups; if business be
dull he even devises scandal among neighbors, and sets them at enmity.
Thus he concocts his accusations of immorality, or drunkenness, or
profanity, or uncharity towards neighbors, and writes them busily down
in his _quorum nomina_, or formulas of citations to appear before the
official's court. "My _corum nomine_ beares such swaye," he boasts,
"They'le sell their clothes my fees to pay." But, remarks the devil
after listening to all this, surely the innocent pay no court fees,
"But answere and discharged bee." "My _corum nomine_ sayth not so,"
rejoins the apparitor, "For all pay fees before they goe.--The
lawier's fees must needs be payd,--And every clarke in his degree--Or
els the lawe cannot be stayd--But excommunicate must they bee." The
devil, amazed and disgusted at laws which "excell the paines of hell,"
turns to go, whereupon the apparitor seeks to arrest and fine him for
traveling on the Sabbath. Exclaiming "Thou art no constable!" the
devil pounces upon the unworthy officer and carries him off to
hell.[185] Thirdly, even when at their best and conducted by upright
judges and officers, the modes of proof in force in the courts
Christian were sometimes utterly inadequate as means for getting at
the truth. The inquest, or trial by jury, had never been introduced
into these courts, where the archaic system of compurgation[186] still
lingered.
If a man for want of friends, or for want of good reputation, were
unable to procure compurgators to attend him at visitations or courts,
held sometimes twenty miles and more away,[187] he might be condemned
as guilty of specific acts which he had never committed.[188] He might
even fail in his proof because he was poor. When the judge arraigned
Lewis Billings of Barking, Essex archdeaconry, for "that he hath
failed in his purgacion," Billings pleaded "that he is a very poore
man and not able to procure his neighbours to come to the cort, and
beare their charges."[189] But, as is well known, contemporaries
attacked not only the inferior officers, but the judges themselves.
Complaints of great abuses were loud and long,[190] and when the
ecclesiastical courts were abolished by the Long Parliament in
1641,[191] the satirical literature of the day celebrated their
downfall with a verve, a gusto, and an exultation amazing to one not
familiar with the procedure of these courts.[192]
As was mentioned at the beginning of this chapter, the secular judges
were given statutory authority to take cognizance of breaches of the
order prescribed by the Book of Common Prayer, of the offence of not
attending church, and other delinquencies against the legal settlement
of religion. Hence in these matters they exercised what might be
called a sort of ecclesiastical jurisdiction in aid of the ordinary
and concurrently with him, though their mode of procedure, of course,
was that of the common law, possessing nothing in common with the
practice adopted in courts Christian. Men who were "hinderers" and
"contemners" of religion; who refrained from going to church without
lawful cause; who had mass-books or super-altars[193] in their
possession;[194] who spoke in contempt of the Book of Common Prayer
and its rites;[195] who caused their children to be baptized with
forms other than those prescribed;[196] ministers who omitted the
cross in baptism;[197] who left off the surplice;[198] who refused to
church women;[199] who called purification "a Jewish ceremony," or who
in their sermons preached seditious doctrine[200]--all these and other
like offenders were indicted at quarter sessions or at the assizes.
CHAPTER II.
PARISH FINANCE.
Speaking generally of the average parish, Elizabethan churchwardens
accounts and vestry minutes show that for the purposes of raising
money amongst themselves to meet every-day parish expenditures,[201]
the parishioners of the period did not commonly resort to rates, if by
"rate" be understood a general assessment of all lands or all goods
alike at a fixed percentage of their revenue or value above a minimum
exempted.
It must not be supposed, however, that in the case of offerings or
gatherings, or of levies to raise a certain sum where each man
assessed himself, it was entirely optional for each to give or to
refuse. What a man customarily gave, or what he had promised to give,
or, again, what the parish thought he ought to give, that the ordinary
might compel him to give.[202] From an offering or a voluntary
assessment to a rate is often but a short step, and the two former
shade off into the latter almost imperceptibly. The justices of the
peace and the ecclesiastical authorities usually cast lump sums upon
the parishes, leaving ways and means to the parishioners themselves.
But it was, of course, optional with the justices to rate each
individual separately when it seemed good to them, and for this they
had the Queen's subsidy books to guide them. Here, however, we are
chiefly concerned with the raising of money amongst the parishioners
themselves. How manifold, how ingenious were the parochial devices for
creating resources, it is the purpose of this chapter to set forth.
But before proceeding to the parish expedients, properly so called,
for raising money, it will be well to say something of parish
endowments, whether in lands, houses or funds. According as the
revenue from these was available for general, or at least for various
purposes, or, on the other hand, was impressed with a trust for some
specific object, these endowments may be divided into general and
special. Parishes well endowed might be able to dispense with some of
the devices for money-getting which we shall have occasion to
enumerate, but then, after all, endowments might come and they might
go;[203] moreover, the financial policy of any one parish would, of
course, differ according to the disposition or the ability of those
who shaped it.
Of Loddon, Norfolk, we are told that "no complaint appears about
Church Rates, for there were none, as the revenue of the Town Farm ...
rendered a tax of that description unnecessary."[204]
Of St. Petrock's, Exeter, we are informed that "the parish became so
well endowed by donations of land and houses as to enable the wardens
to dispense almost entirely with the quarterly collections entered in
the earlier accounts."[205] The editor of the Thatcham, Berks,
Accounts, writes: "In the early years of these churchwardens accounts
the available funds were derived chiefly from the two oldest
charities, one called 'Lowndye's Almshouses,' the first account of
which is for the year ... 1561 ... to 1562; the other known as 'the
Church Estate,' the first account of which begins in 1566."[206]
Summoned by the Bodmin, Cornwall, justices in January, 159-4/5, to
make a report as to the parish stock, the representatives of Stratton
certify at sessions that their stock "am[oun]ts to the now some of
Sixteene poundes, some yeares it is more & some yeares lesse...." And,
they continue, "the vsinge of our sayde stocke is by the two wardens &
the rest of the eight men w[hi]ch for the same stande sworne, And it
is bestowed aboute her ma[jes]ties service, for buyenge of armor,
settinge forth of souldiers w[i]th powder & shott.... And likewise for
the relievinge & mainetayning of the poore...." They thereupon give
the names of the impotent and decrepit persons and orphan children
"wholly relieved" by the parish, ten in number, and add that there are
upwards of a hundred poor "w[h]ich are not able to liue of themselues,
but haue reliefe dayly one thinge or another of the seide
p[ar]ish."[207] The little parish of St. Michael's in Bedwardine,
Worcestershire,[208] possessed lands and tenements in various
parishes, and in 1599 invested L10 in buying two more tenements in
Worcester city.[209] Its wardens accounts, we are told by their
editor, disclose that there was never any lack of money for parish
purposes "in spite of a rather lavish expenditure at times in the
luxury of law[suits]."[210] Lapworth, Warwickshire, had many acres of
parish land.[211] The churchwardens of St. John's, Glastonbury,
Somerset, return in their accounts the rent of the parish lands in
1588 at L9 13s. 10d.,[212] and, as these accounts show, they
occasionally received important sums for fines on changes of tenants.
The various properties managed by the wardens of St. Michael's, Bath,
numbered thirty-seven in 1527, yielding a revenue of L11 8s.;[213] and
even in 1572 the rent amounted to L11 8s.[214]
Indeed, though parish lands and houses were generally vested as to
title in trustees (often a numerous and cumbersome body),[215] the
churchwardens themselves and sometimes other accountants,[216] who
like the wardens were appointed from year to year, usually exercised
the actual management. The feoffees existed chiefly for the purpose of
making it difficult to alienate the parish properties, "and the larger
the trust body the more difficult such alienation was supposed to
be."[217]
Contenting ourselves with the above examples, which could easily be
multiplied, we pass on under this same head of general endowments to
an interesting form of personal property, viz., cattle, for not only
did the wardens derive receipts from parish holdings of real estate,
but also from _Endowments of Cows or Sheep_. The Pittington, Durham,
Twelve Men, a sort of parish executive and administrative body, enact
in 1584 "that everie iiij pounde rent[218] within this parrishe, as
well of hamlets as townshippes, shall gras[219] winter and somer one
shepe for the behoufe of this church;"[220] and we are told that these
"Church Shepe," as they were called, were here one of the chief means
of raising funds for parochial purposes.[221] It was the custom of
pious donors, especially among the lowly, to leave one or more sheep
or cows to their parish. In the year 1559 twelve sheep were thus given
or bequeathed to Wootton Church, Hants, by ten donors.[222] These
sheep, as well as the parish cows, were often hired out to
parishioners, who gave security for their return. Sometimes they were
given to poor men at a reduced rent, and thus they served to support
the poor.[223]
That the keeping of cattle was a well-recognized source of parish
income is seen by the Queen's Injunctions of 1559 in which she alludes
to "the profit of cattle" among other sources of parish revenue to be
devoted to the poor, "and if they be provided for, then to the
reparation of highways next adjoining," or to the repair of the
church.[224]
Leaving the topic of general endowments to take up those sources of
revenue destined to defray particular forms of expenditure, we find
that _Permanent Parish Endowments_ in lands, goods or money devoted to
the defraying of _Specific Parish Administrative Burdens_ or
_Utilities_ were very numerous in the local documents of the 16th
century. Sometimes a land or fund was set apart by the donor, or by
the parish itself, for the support of a parish servant or
officer;[225] sometimes its revenue maintained this or that cripple or
blind man,[226] or a number of them; sometimes it was used for feeding
the poor,[227] or for buying wearing apparel for them;[228] for
setting them at work in houses of correction,[229] or for parish
education.[230]
In particular, lands or funds were frequently set apart as special and
permanent endowments for the repair of bridges.[231] In fact, the
proceeds of parish lands or other endowments might be appropriated to
alleviate any tax burden whatsoever. In 1549 it was stated by the
wardens of North Elmham, Norfolk, that the net proceeds of the five
and thirty or forty acres which they rented out were devoted
exclusively towards the paying of the fifteenths due from time to time
to the king and his successors.[232]
To illustrate the variety of purposes for which parish trusts were
created, I cannot do better than quote part of the preamble of the 43
Eliz. c. 4, known as the Statute of Charitable Uses: "Whereas Landes,
Tenements, Rentes ... Money and Stockes of Money," it is there
rehearsed, "have bene heretofore given, limitted ... and assigned ...
some for Releife of aged, impotent and poore people, some for
Maintenaunce of sicke and maymed Souldiers and Marriners, Schooles of
Learninge ... some for Repaire of Bridges, Fortes, Havens, Causwaies,
Churches, Sea-bankes and Highewaies, some for Educac[i]on and
p[re]fermente of Orphans, some for or towardes Reliefe, Stocke or
Maintenaunce for Howses of Correcc[i]on, some for Mariages of poore
Maides, some for Supportac[i]on, Ayde and Helpe of younge Tradesmen,
Handiecraftesmen and p[er]sons decayed, and others ... for aide or
ease of any poore Inhabitants conc[er]ninge paymente of Fifteenes,
settinge out of Souldiers and other Taxes [etc.]...."[233]
As for money and goods left by testators or given _inter vivos_ for
_Temporary Expenses_ or _Special Occasions_ (as opposed to the
creation of permanent trusts and endowments), we find a constant
stream of such benefactions throughout the Elizabethan period.
By the Queen's Injunctions of 1559 parsons are diligently to exhort
their parishioners, "and especially when men make their testaments,"
to give to the poor-box, the surplus of which, after provision for the
needy, might be devoted to church and highway repair.[234]
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