A HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND 



followed the military triumph of puritanism, the leading clergy of the 

 diocese, as well as the dean and chapter, were ejected from their livings. 

 If there was any tendency on the part of those with royalist proclivities 

 to hold on, the committee of ' tryers' accepted the most flimsy charges 

 wherewith to oust them from their parishes. 



There can be no doubt that many of the clergy, specially those in 

 the poorer and more secluded parishes, bent their necks to the puritan 

 yoke and stood their ground. It is difficult to estimate the motives of 

 those who accepted the directory and swore to maintain the covenant, 

 but there is evidence that if some did so from conviction, others acted 

 from policy. 1 Against these may be placed the example of Timothy 

 Tullie, rector of Cliburn, who became ' the bright, particular star ' of 

 presbyterianism while the Commonwealth lasted, but who altered his 

 orbit without dimming his lustre by becoming a canon of York 2 on the 

 restoration of the church and crown. The committee of ' tryers,' not- 

 withstanding the supposed leniency with which they exercised their 

 unpleasant vocation, were quite unable to find substitutes of their own 

 way of thinking for the vacant benefices. For fourteen years the pre- 

 cincts of the cathedral lay in ruins, and the floor of the cathedral itself 

 was common ground at the disposal of all the sects. The principal 

 churches of the diocese were supplied either by resident or itinerant 

 ministers of the presbyterian, independent or baptist persuasion, but the 

 presbyterians predominated in number and influence. If pluralism could 

 be alleged with truth as a defect of the old order of church government, 

 it was repeated in an aggravated form, though perhaps from necessity, 

 when the sequestrators had finished their work, for it was no uncommon 

 thing for one minister under the new regime to be the peripatetic pastor 

 of three parishes. Some of the churches were shut up, and most of the 

 preachers admitted by the commissioners were not ministers at all, 3 not 

 even according to the religious conceptions of the period. 



For some time after the fall of episcopacy there was no ecclesias- 

 tical or religious organization among the ministers and no cohesion 

 among the parishes. The vacant churches had been allotted to members 

 of various sects as each sect in turn had gained the mastery of the local 

 committees. In any group of parishes it was possible to find the minis- 

 ters in charge belonging to opposing denominations. The presbyterians 

 endeavoured to form some sort of church discipline, but every attempt 

 at combination created jealousy among the rest and led to controversy 

 and strife. The first effort to form an alliance between the presbyterians 

 and independents was begun in 1653, 'but it took not' among the 

 brethren of ' congregational judgment.' It is a singular coincidence 



1 Thomas Denton, writing in 1 687-8, stated that ' the Common Prayer was read in the church 

 of Sebergham in all ye late times of trouble, and we never had a phanatick in the parish, neither then 

 nor since ' (Perambulation of Cumb. in 1687-8, MS. f. 85). 



2 Hardy, Le Neve, iii. 190. Timothy Tullie was collated to Cliburn by Bishop Potter on 19 June 

 1639 (Carl. Epis. Reg. Potter, MS. f. 301). 



o Burton, Life of Sir Philip Musgrave (Carlisle Tracts), p. 34 ; Walker, Sufferings of the Clergy, 

 i. 97 ; George Fox's journal, Leeds edition, i. 223. 



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