ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



Conference ought to be accepted as closing the Puritan remonstrances, but to 

 his great annoyance the knights of the shire of Northampton almost 

 immediately raised the question in Parliament. 



On 23 March, 1604, Sir Edward Montagu, who at that time shared the 

 county representation with Sir Valentine Knightley, delivered himself in the 

 House of Commons of several grievances which he had been desired by his 

 constituents to make known. They were three in number, the first relating 

 to the intolerable burden of the Commissaries' Courts, and the third to the 

 depopulation and excessive conversion of tillage into pasturage. The second 

 was : — 'The suspension of grave, learned, and sober-minded ministers for not 

 observing certain ceremonies, long since by many disused.'^ In pursuance of Sir 

 Edward's motion concerning the grievance of the Commissaries' Courts, the 

 speaker delivered a message from the king on 16 April, desiring that there 

 might be a conference between the Commons and the bishops, to which the 

 House assented. On the bishop of London requesting that they hold 

 conference with Convocation, the House of Commons at first 'utterly refused' 

 this, as establishing a new precedent, but a compromise was effected by the 

 Lords appointing thirty of their House (including the bishops) to confer with 

 sixty of the Commons. On 4 June the Lords and Commons began a confer- 

 ence on matters of religion, but the bishop of London read a letter from 

 Convocation inhibiting the bishops from conferring with the Commons, ' for 

 that the laity had no authority to meddle in these matters now the king had 

 granted those letters patent.' On 8 June this was reported to the House, 

 ' who took it in ill-part, and chose a Committee to draw a petition for 

 toleration of ceremonies,' which was presented to the House and twice read, 

 and ordered to be presented to His Majesty. The prorogation of Parliament 

 prevented any further steps. 



In February of the following year, the two knights of the shire of 

 Northampton undertook to present to the king and council a petition against 

 the suspension of the non -conforming ministers in Northamptonshire, but it 

 was delivered back to them to amend. On their declining to do so, both Sir 

 Edward Montagu and Sir Valentine Knightley were put out of all commissions 

 in His Majesty's service, and ordered to depart into the country. Sir Edward 

 Montagu was, however, soon afterwards reconciled to the king through his 

 brother James, dean of the Chapel Royal. In the year 1605 it was Sir 

 Edward's hand that drew up the ' Act for a Public Thanksgiving ' on 

 5 November for deliverance from the Gunpowder Plot. Sir Richard 

 Knightley (the father of Sir Valentine), as the prime mover in this petition, 

 was removed from the lieutenancy and commission of the peace, placed in 

 confinement in London for a time, and fined ^(^2,000. Other Northampton- 

 shire gentlemen, including Sir W. Lane and Erasmus Dryden, were severely 

 treated, the council pronouncing the question to be ' factius and seditious.' * 

 The very heavy fine on Sir Richard Knightley was doubtless caused by the 

 recollection of his previous Marprelate action. 



The reign of James I was the period during which the position of the 

 Church of England became more clearly defined and consolidated, while the 

 writings of Hooker, Andrewes, and Jeremy Taylor prepared the way for the 



' Hist. MSS. Com. 1900. Rep. on MSS. of Lord Montagu of Beaulieu, 42-5. 

 ' S.P. Dom. Jas. I, xii, 69, 74, 94, 95. 



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