A HISTORY OF NORFOLK 



that to refund it he moved from the bishop's palace to an episcopal grange 

 at Ludham. One of his greatest friends was John Foxe, the martyrologist, 

 who is said to have Hved with him for a time, and to have preached in his 

 diocese.' 



A commission was issued to administer the Oath of Supremacy, 23 May, 

 1559, and sessions were held in the following September at Norwich 

 Cathedral ; St. Peter Mancroft, Norwich ; North Walsham, Walsingham, 

 Kino-'s Lynn, Swaffliam, and Thetford.^ The signatures for the diocese 

 seem to show a ready acceptance, but the impression left is that no great 

 diligence was used to enforce subscription.' Norwich is one of the eleven 

 dioceses in which complete lists of the deprivations that resulted can be 

 obtained from the registers ; among the Norfolk clergy deprived were the 

 dean of Norwich, John Harpsfield, and one Harcourt, a canon.* The 

 queen's speech at the opening of her first Parliament desired that such laws 

 should be passed as would prevent both the danger of idolatry and superstition, 

 and the opposite peril of irreverence and irreligion. Her first progress 

 through the eastern counties convinced her, according to Strype,^ that ' there 

 was little or no order observed in the public service, few or none wearing the 

 surplice, and the bishop of Norwich was thought remiss, and winked at 

 schismatics.' It would be no recommendation to Elizabeth that he 

 conspicuously favoured the Genevan party, and was a married man.* 



That there were many abuses existing was shown in the bishop's first 

 visitation, begun 2 May, 1561, and that the inconoclasm in his diocese had 

 been very widespread is clear from his own injunctions, which are of very 

 o-reat value, not only for the light they throw on the condition of the 

 churches, but for their testimony as to church customs at the time.' 



' John Foxe was appointed tutor, by the influence of the duchess of Richmond, to the orphan children of 

 Henry Howard, earl of Surrey, executed 9 Jan. 1546-7 : two boys, Thomas, afterwards duke of Norfolk, and 

 Henry Howard, afterwards earl of Northampton, and three girls. He taught them at the castle of Reigate for 

 five years, and their subsequent careers testify that he did not interfere with their religious views. But when, 

 on the accession of Mary, the old duke of Norfolk, grandfather of his pupils, was released from the Tower, he 

 was dismissed. The elder boy, Thomas, had a great aflectlon for him, and Foxe attended him on the scaffold 

 at his execution ; he had written a strong protest to him against his proposed marriage with Mary queen of 

 Scots. 



' Gee, Elizabethan Clergy, 96. ' Ibid. 102. ' Ibid. 237, 225. 



^ Life of Parker, i, 212. 



° In August, I 561, an order was issued excluding women and children from residence in the enclosures of 

 colleges and cathedrals. 



^ Injunctions exhibited by John by God's sufferance bishop of Norwich in his first visitation beginning 

 the second dale of Maye in the 3rd yeare of our Sovereign Lady Elizabeth. 



First, y' every parson, vicare and Curate, doo so order the coiiion service within the City of Norwich & 

 other lyke places where be dyvers parish churches in one toune, that it may be doon on y' Sondaie by nine of 

 the clok, before the beginning of the sermon, where any is appointed, y' all the people after comon prayers be 

 doon in their parish churches may resort thether to heare the sermon. 



2. Item, that as many of them as be entred into orders do sale the morning and evening prayers daily in 

 English or Latten, either openly or privatelie, that they may be the more ready in the Scriptures. 



3. Item, that they see unto their Clerks and Sextons, if they doe ring at the buriall of the deade, noone 

 or curphue, they ring but one peall, & that very shortt, omitting all other unnecessarie ringings as it is 

 prescribed by order taken therein. 



4. Item, that they neither suffer the Lordes table to be hanged and decked like an aulter, neyther use 

 anv oestures of the popish masse in y* time of ministracion of the communion, as shitting of the boke, washing, 

 breathing, crossing or such like. 



5. Item, that they baptize not children on the working dales, or when the congregation is not come 

 together, except it be thought that evident jeopardie require the contrarie. 



6. Item, that they marie no yonge folkes, except they examin them before, whether they can save the 

 articles of the Xtian faithe, the Lordes Prayer, and the ten commandments : and if they cannot then to stay 

 them from going forward till they can say them. Likewise that they examin the godfathers and the god- 



262 



