A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



ment in its earlier stages. Indeed, prominent as was the part which he 

 played in the religious affairs of his day/ he was a lax administrator of his 

 diocese, and the venality of his officers was notorious. He much im- 

 poverished the see in favour of Cecil (through whose influence he is said to 

 have obtained it) and of the queen, and it was perhaps fortunate for Peter- 

 borough that in 1585 he was translated to Norwich.'' The Puritan move- 

 ment, however, continued its course unabated under his successor, Richard 

 Rowland,' as indeed has already appeared. A paper, dated 16 July, 1590, 

 containing charges brought against ' the ministers of Northamptonshire and 

 .Warwickshire ' * indicates to what length in these counties the movement had 

 gone in the direction of Presbyterianism. Above the ' classes ' were general 

 ' synods,' and in doctrine and worship as well as in organization, most of the 

 principal notes of Presbyterianism were already present, either in actual prac- 

 tice or in intention. ° There appear to have been about four ' classes ' to a 

 county,^ and those of Northamptonshire were attended by the ' ministers' of 

 Warkton, ' Courtnoll ' (Courteenhall), ' Cookenoe ' (Cogenhoe), Higham, 

 Abington, Wellingborough, Weeden (Weedon), and other places.^ 



When Archbishop Whitgift succeeded to the primacy, in 1583, most 

 stringent subscriptions were insisted on from all exercising any ecclesiastical 

 functions, pledging them to the use of the Book of Common Prayer, and none 

 other, in their ministrations. In the following year a list of twenty-five in- 

 terrogatories was drawn up, which were to be administered by the court of 

 High Commission to any of the clergy whom the court thought good to 

 question. Whitgift promised Burghley that resort would not be made to the 

 interrogatories, save when private remonstrance failed. In 1585 — to counter- 

 act parliamentary action, and prove to the queen and Burghley that the 

 Puritan clergy were as a body small in number, and slender in ability, and 

 had acquired a fictitious importance through the support of some in high 

 places — the archbishop had a return prepared of the conforming and non- 

 conforming clergy throughout the whole of the province of Canterbury, 

 stating their degrees. Unfortunately the return for Peterborough is wanting, 

 but out often dioceses there were 786 beneficed incumbents who conformed 

 to the law, and only 49 who did not. A new code of canons was issued, and 

 greater pressure used towards the offenders. Naturally angry at the energy of 

 the archbishop, and the warm support given him by Elizabeth, the more 

 extreme of the Puritans retaliated, and their outburst of invective brought 

 into play the suspended use of the interrogatories of the Star Chamber. 



The Marprelate Tracts,* in 1588-90, were most intimately connected 

 with Northamptonshire. Hatred of episcopacy was the keynote of the whole 

 series of these tracts, seven in number, which were but an amplification of 

 the text supplied by Tyndale, ' That the Bishops were Antichrists, inasmuch 



' He was concerned in the preparation of the Bishops' Bible {Diet. Nat. Biog. L, 396), and was one of the 

 seven bishops who, in 1583, presented to the queen a body of articles for the general government of the 

 church {Ca/. S.P. Dom. Eltz. clxiii, 31). His writings were placed in the Roman Index (Gunton, Hist, of 

 Peterburgh, 72). He seems to have had a reputation for skill in reducing individual opponents of the Eliza- 

 bethan Settlement to conformity {Acts ofP.C. (New Set.), xii, 338, 362 ; xiii, 12). 



' Stubbs, Reg Sacr. Angl. 83. ' Ibid. 86. 



* Printed (from Lansd. MS. Ixiv, fol. 51) in Serjeantson, Hist, of St. Peter's, 29. 



^ Ibid, fmssim. ^ Ibid. 7, § 4. ^ Ibid. 4, § 9. 



*The books to be consulted on the Martin Marprelate controversy are those by Maskell, in 1845, 

 and Arber in 1894 ; Lansd. MS. 7,042, and J. H. Shakespeare, BaJ>tist anJ Congregationa! Pioneers, 94-104. 



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