A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



Lancashire out of twenty-five justices only five were known to be f^vo^^ble 

 to the proceedings of the government in matter of rehgion, he remaining 

 twenty being not favourable thereto, and as a consequence inclinable to the 

 Papists Among these twenty are some of the most representative and best- 

 known names i^n the county. Later on the administration took steps 

 to purge and reinforce the bench, but at the moment it would appear that 

 the bishop found difficulty in suggesting Protestant names of standing in the 

 county fit^ to be made justices. In the hundreds of Amounderness and 

 Leyland he can suggest none, and in the remaining three hundreds only ten 



names. 



'it is unfortunate that no clear indication of the immediate effect of the 



Act of 1563 can be given, as the 1564 visitation of the diocese of York did 



not extend to the see of Chester. The bishop of Chester compounded with 



the archbishop for it, and refrained from visiting his diocese, contenting^him- 



self with collecting the procuration moneys by means of his servants. bo 



that all the information we possess relating to it is confined to the bishop of 



Durham's letter to the archbishop of Canterbury on the state of his three 



parishes of Rochdale, Blackburn, and Whalley.'" It is probable that the 



Act of 1563 was enacted only in terrorem, and would have remained unused 



but for the events of the pontificate of Pius V. With his advent in 1566 



a change came over the attitude of the English Roman Catholics. Hitherto 



the laity had so far acquiesced in the Church settlement as to attend their 



parish church, although a committee appointed by the council of Trent had 



decided against this practice. On his accession Pius V appointed two 



EngUsh exiles in Louvain, Dr. Sanders and Dr. Harding, apostolic delegates 



to make known to the faithful in England the papal sentence which declared 



it a mortal sin to frequent the Protestant church service. Accordingly Sanders 



wrote a pastoral letter which he entrusted to Lawrence Vaux, late warden of 



Manchester. Vaux crossed to England, and making for Lancashire, issued 



on 2 November, 1566, a circular to his Lancashire friends in which he gave 



the substance of Sanders' pastoral. ' What I write heare to youe I wold 



wysse Sir Richard MoUineux, Sir W. Norris and other my friends to be 



partakers.''" 



This letter appears to have reached the hands of the government in the 

 following year. On 20 December, 1567, information was sent to the Privy 

 Council that certain gentlemen in Lancashire had taken a solemn oath not to 

 come to communion and rejoiced greatly at the report of a Spanish invasion."" 



Some three weeks or a month before Christmas, 1567, the bishop of 

 Chester was also informed of great confederacies presently in Lancashire by 

 sundry Papists there lurking who have stirred divers gentry to their faction 

 and sworn them together not to come to church ; and he was advised to 

 execute the ecclesiastical commissions with the earl of Derby, or else it can- 

 not be holpen, for many church doors be shut up and the curates refuse to 

 serve as it is now appointed to be used in the church. The bishop replied 

 he had heard Mr. Ashton, and would send for the offenders by precept.'** 



■•' Sti)-pe, Life of Parker, \, 361. -« Ibid. 362. 



"' S.P. Dom. Eliz. vol. 41, No. 12, Nov. 1566. 



"■ Ibid. vol. 44, No. 56. The letter just quoted was probably an inclosure in this paper, and has been 

 separated from it by accident. 



*" Ibid. vol. 48, No. 35, undated. 



52 



