LIFE OF ARCHBISHOP SHARP. 197 



of those parishes to which they presented should 

 be provided of a good minister, one that was 

 sober and regular, and preached to them by his 

 life, as well as his sermons. 



To a noble lord, who was more than ordina- 

 rily delicate in the choice of clerks for livings 

 in his gift, and who had desired the Archbishop 

 to give him a man for a benefice in the diocese of 

 Carlisle, in his patronage, that ivould set up his 

 rest there, and ea^pect no other preferment, &c.; 

 he wrote the following character of the cler- 

 gyman he had pitched upon for his lordship's 

 service, viz. " He is a good scholar, of a regu- 

 lar life, a right honest and good tempered man, 

 and will take a conscientious care of his flock. 



** I do not name him to your lordship but with 

 a design that he should make good all the points 

 that your lordship requires, viz. that he shall 

 constantly reside upon the place, and make it 

 the whole business of his life to look after his 

 cure. My Lord, if your lordship gives him the 

 living, he takes it upon these conditions, and I 

 will undertake they shall be made good." 



By this it appears that the Archbishop did 

 allow of promises and contracts at the taking of 

 livings, provided they were not of a Simonical 

 nature, had nothing of a pecuniary considera- 

 tion, nor any relation to the profits or rights of 

 the benefice. For when either of these came into 



