A HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND 



letter ' from an old man just recovering from a severe illness, unable to 

 undertake a journey to London. He deplored the obvious vices and 

 errors which were beginning to spread without check through Christen- 

 dom, and wished Wolsey success in their repression a task which the 

 aged prelate acknowledged to be difficult. That was in 1520, be it 

 remembered, several years before the domestic affairs of Henry VIII. 

 had brought him into conflict with the papacy. This movement was 

 a spontaneous effort of the English church to purge herself of the egregia 

 vicia et errores and to bring herself into line with the requirements of a 

 more enlightened age. In the hands of a prelate like Bishop Penny the 

 new injunctions must have made a change in the religious houses and 

 among the clergy within his jurisdiction. 



The ecclesiastical movement was continued with considerable 

 vigour during the early portion of the episcopate of John Kite, who 

 succeeded Bishop Penny in 1521. Wolsey had little faith in non- 

 resident bishops. A few months after his translation from Armagh * 

 my lord of Carlisle was requested with other prelates to be person- 

 ally within his diocese on an appointed day. Lord Dacre, the steward 

 of the episcopal manors, pleaded with the cardinal for delay owing 

 to the scarceness of provisions in Cumberland, of which, he said, 

 there was not enough to sustain the people without the help of the other 

 northern counties. 3 There is abundant evidence that Bishop Kite was 

 the firm ally of Wolsey in the reformation of the church, and an earnest 

 prelate in the pastoral care of his people. ' I beseech you of pity,' he 

 wrote to the cardinal in 1523, the year after his coming, ' to have mercy 

 of many good men, women, and children of the parish of Bewcastle 

 within my diocese, who, since before Easter last past, have had neither 

 sacrament nor sacramental that I know of, though many of them have 

 been often with me for redress. There are both aged and young who 

 have not offended and yet are in like punishment.'* The diocese of 

 Carlisle had its share in the reforming movement of this period. 5 The 



' L. and P. of Henry VIII., vol. iii. 77. The letter of Bishop Penny is the earliest known document 

 connected with the Reformation in the diocese of Carlisle. It has been printed in full by the present 

 writer in The Monasteries of Cumb. and Westmor. before Dissolution, App. i., Carlisle Scientific and Literary 

 Society, 1899. 



John Kite, archbishop of Armagh, who had been employed on the King's business in Spain, was 

 named among the bishops to attend Henry VIII. to ' The Field of the Cloth of Gold ' (Rymer, Fcsdera, 

 xiii. 710). In the summer of 1521 he was translated to Carlisle through Wolsey's influence. The cost 

 of the papal bulls amounted to 1,790 ducats, but for Wolsey's sake 275 ducats were remitted. It was 

 considered a great compliment, as the pope was in great need of money at the time (Cotton MS. Vitellius, 

 B. iv. 132, 136 ; L. and P. of Henry VIII., vol. iii. 1430-1, 1477). Kite had restitution of the temporali- 

 ties of the see on 12 November, 1521 (Pat. 13 Hen. VIII. pt. I, m. n ; Rymer, Fcedera, xiii. 759); the 

 papal bull, authorizing the preferment, bears date 12 July (L. and P. of Henry fill., iii. 1757)- Bishop 

 Penny must have died early in 1521. 



Cotton MS. Caligula, B. ii. 252. 



4 L. and P. of Henry VIIL, vol. iii. 34, 36. The bearer of this letter to Wolsey was ' a clerke of my 

 dyocesse, my servant and offycyall (who) hath licence of me, in as moche as my power is, for iij yeres to 

 goo to his booke at some unyversite ' if necessary beyond the sea. 



5 Bishop Kite's friendship with the cardinal is well known. He was one of the bishops with whom 

 Wolsey was accused of taking secret counsel in Lord Darcy's impeachment (L. and P. of Henry VIIL, iv. 

 5749). After his fall, the cardinal and his attendants ' continued for the space of three or four weeks 

 without beds, sheets, table cloths, cups and dishes to eat our meat or to lie in.' He was ' compelled to 



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