A HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND 



to chapter acts. As the position had become intolerable, Bishop Nicol- 

 son interposed and urged the members of the church to compose their 

 differences, but as the admonition was without effect he determined to 

 visit and enforce obedience. The scene in the chapter house between 

 the bishop and Dr. Todd, the dean's proxy, was not edifying. Formal 

 objection was taken to the visitation on the ground that the Queen alone 

 was the legal visitor. Compromise was now impossible. The bishop 

 excommunicated Dr. Todd. A war of pamphlets ensued. The quarrel 

 was carried to the civil courts and to the House of Commons. At 

 length an Act of Parliament (6 Anne, c. 21) was passed confirming the 

 validity of the statutes x ; the doctor was released from the ban of excom- 

 munication, and the trouble was at an end. 2 



The preaching of John Wesley in Cumberland was not attended 

 with the enthusiasm and wholesale conversions which marked the pro- 

 gress of George Fox a century before. The mass of the population, 

 though they listened with respect, remained unmoved ; the gentry as a 

 rule stood aloof. When the great preacher visited the county, he 

 was not recognized by the bishop of the diocese, and had neither 

 sympathy nor support from the clergy. In a private house or at 

 the market cross or in some public building like a town hall, Wesley 

 exercised the gifts of his vocation as he journeyed from place to 

 place. On 11 April 1753 he found that the love of many of the 

 society in Whitehaven had ' waxed cold,' though ' a considerable number 

 appeared to be growing in grace.' On the following Sunday ' he 

 preached in the afternoon at Cockermouth to well nigh all the inhabi- 

 tants of the town.' At Branthwaite in 1757 ' many of the congregation 

 came from far ' to hear him ; * the word had free course ' at Cocker- 

 mouth, ' even the gentry seemed desirous ' of accepting his doctrine. 

 On his return to Cumberland in 1761 it can scarcely be said that he 

 was otherwise than disappointed with the fruits of his previous labours. 

 The whole congregation at Workington behaved well, but he could not 

 perceive that the greater part understood anything of the matter. 

 Wesley's experience of the people of Wigton had a depressing effect 

 upon him. ' The congregation when I began,' he says, 'consisted of 

 one woman, two boys, and three or four little girls, but in a quarter of 

 an hour we had most of the town. I was a good deal moved at the 

 exquisite self-sufficiency, which was visible in the countenance, air, and 

 whole deportment of a considerable part of them.' When he reached 

 Carlisle in 1770 he found that ' it was here a day of small things, the 

 society consisting but of fifteen members.' On a further visit to the 



1 A full account of this squabble may be gathered from the numerous documents collected by Nichols 

 and printed in his Letters of Wm. Nicolson, and the bishop's private sentiments may be seen in Bishop 

 Nicotian's Diaries, now in course of publication by the Bishop of Barrow-in-Furness in the new series of 

 the Cumb. and Westmor. Arch, Soc. Trans. The legal aspect of the case has been treated exhaustively 

 by Burn, Eccl. Law (ed. Phillimore, 1842), ii. 94-104, and by Phillimore, Eccl. Law (ed. 1873),!. 173-84. 



2 Another dispute arose in 1752 on the interpretation of the statutes in relation to the dean's nega- 

 tive power in the conferring of benefices. Compare Phillimore, Eccles. Law, i. 192-4, with Carl. Epis. 

 Reg. Osbaldiston, ff. 175-7, 235-7. The peace of the capitular body was again disturbed in 1858 by 

 the interference of Dean Close with the duties of the precentor. 



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