CHAPTER VII

CIVIL STRIFE

JOHN THORNBOROUGH's reign of a quarter of a century closed on July 3, 1641. He had lived, mainly at Hartlebury, all through the waxing opposition of the Commons to the Crown; he had heard, in his last weeks, of the execution of Strafford, and had known that Laud was a prisoner in the Tower. But for him this was only the culmination of a long series of signs of the mischief which was brewing for the Church, and he knew that the mischief had a double origin, Romanist and Puritan. If he ever studied the official documents of his predecessors, he must have realised that, for forty years and more, the effort to restrain the two extremes had been a constant anxiety to the occupant of the castle. One of his predecessors-it was almost certainly John Whitgift1 in 1577 —summed it all up in a visitation article.

32. Item whether there be any in your parish that be suspected to go to mass or other secret meeting as prophesying or any other kind of service or exercise than such as is appointed by authority and set down in the Book of Common Prayer; . . . any maintainers of superstition or false opinions, or which hold or maintain anything contrary either to the Book of Common Prayer or the Articles of Religion set down by the clergy of both provinces ?

From that date onwards, as Thornborough must have known, there had been continuous effort to hunt down or despoil those who favoured the mass, and to discourage and harass those who attended the prophesyings. He

1 Strangely enough, the only known copy of the document is in the Liber Canonum of the Dean and Chapter of Worcester (A. 14). It has been printed by Professor W. P. M. Kennedy in Elizabethan Episcopal Administration (Alcuin Club), ii. 53 ff.

was here long enough to form a fair judgment as to which of the two dissident elements flourished the more in the county. From Hartlebury he had no great distance to cover in order to find himself at Hindlip, which had been intimately involved in the Gunpowder Plot and in the sheltering of those who fled from the consequences of their deeds, and Huddington, the lair of the Winter family, was not far off. But he had seen a change come over the attitude of the Crown towards Popish recusants. He had been nearly six years at Hartlebury when at the end of July 16221 James instructed the Lord Keeper that the judges were "to grant some grace and connivency to the imprisoned papists of this kingdom." John Williams, being then not only Lord Keeper and bishop of Lincoln, but also dean of Westminster, sent out directions accordingly from "Westminster College on August 2, 16222; and, in a secondary degree, the instructions would affect our bishop as a justice of the peace. The king's "royal pleasure is," he wrote, that "you shall make no niceness or difficulty to extend this his princely favour to all such papists as you shall find prisoners in the gaols of your circuits for any church recusancy whatsoever." If their offence was solely in the sphere of religion, and wholly eschewed politics, the king was anxious that they should have this chance to get free, on probation. Probably Thornborough did not like this policy,

but there it was.

On the other hand, he was himself one instance among many of a growing tolerance towards the Puritan element, which, indeed, was not one element but several. There were, for instance, those who strongly upheld the Presbyterian discipline and had large scruples with regard to much that was contained in the Book of Common Prayer, but who strove mightily to convert the Church of England to their view from within, having no desire to leave it. A potent and by no means unworthy exponent

1 Thornborough's Register (ff. 109, 109b) shows that he was in residence at the time.

2 The documents are printed in Dodd's Church History (ed. Tierney, 1843),

V. CCXCV.

of Puritanism of this kind had been greatly exercising the minds of the bishops of Worcester some thirty years before Thornborough's arrival. Thomas Cartwright1 had engaged in keen and constant struggles at Cambridge with John Whitgift, who passed to Hartlebury Castle from the Master's Lodge at Trinity in 1577. But Whitgift had no episcopal relations with Cartwright as bishop of Worcester, for while Whitgift was at Hartlebury, Cartwright was chiefly at Antwerp. The great Puritan's connexion with the diocese of Worcester arose out of his appointment as master-and, perhaps, the first master-of Lord Leicester's Hospital at Warwick. The actual date of the appointment is not known; the date of the foundation is 1571, and the date of the “ordinances" of the foundation is 1585. By these it was enacted that the bishop, the dean, and the archdeacon of Worcester were to be the visitors after Leicester's death, and that the master, if he desired to take a vacation of any length, must apply in the first instance for the bishop's permission.2

Thus the diocese of Worcester found itself the home of the chiefest and the ablest advocate of the presbyteral system. Cartwright's hospital may have been extraparochial, and its services may have expected to escape episcopal notice; but the hospital did not suffice him; he preached freely both in "the lower parish" (St. Nicholas) and in "the upper parish" (St. Mary). Such action would bring him within the cognisance of the diocesan; indeed, when he was before the High Commission in 1590, it was alleged against him that he faithfully promised (if he might be but tolerated to preach) not to impugne the laws, orders, policy, government, nor governours in this Church of England, but to

1 See a sympathetic and painstaking study, Thomas Cartwright and Elizabethan Puritanism, by A. F. Scott Pearson, D.D. (1925).

2 The present bishop has received several such requests, but is in course of ceding his rights to the bishop of the diocese (Coventry).

3 Dr. Pearson (op. cit., 293) says that the mastership "was exempt from the ordinary jurisdiction of the prelates"; but the bishop had his right of visitation.

4 The articles are printed at length in Fuller, Church History, bk. ix, s. vii, par. 27.

perswade, and procure, so much as he could, both publically and privately, the estimation, and peace of this Church. It was further stated, after a long recital of his "disorders," that Cartwright was presented to the Bishop of Wigorne, his Ordinary," and that the bishop for his contempt suspended him " from preaching, et ab omni functione Ministerii"; that from this he appealed, but "did not prosecute within a year after," and that in consequence the suspension was repeated.

Which of our bishops was it, who found himself compelled to take this, quite ineffective, action against the doughty Puritan, and where did the action have its scene? The latter question is answered in the High Commission's articles, which say that before the bishop he was "convented in the Consistory there," which implies Worcester and the cathedral.

But there is an interesting record among the Baker MSS., which, without giving a date, gives a name which falls in with the accepted dates. It describes how at Warwick and Coventry " Cartwright invaded the Bishops jurisdiction, more than the honest patience of Bp: Freake could endure," which we may compare or contrast with Anthony Wood's statement that at Worcester Freke "was a zealous Assertor of the Church Discipline.” 2 Now Freke, as we have seen, was a constant resident in his castle of Hartlebury. Elected to the bishopric on November 2, 1584, and enthroned by proxy on February 7, 1585,3 he was in effective occupation here in the course of that summer, and so continued, with occasional changes to the palace in Worcester, or with frequent functions at the palace, for which he may have ridden in from Hartlebury. His summons to Cartwright may have taken place at any time between the autumn of 1585, when Cartwright was still at Flushing, and the year 1590, when the High Commission formulated its counts against him; and, when Cartwright got into his post at Warwick,

1 xxviii, ff. 443-5; it is printed in Pearson (op. cit.), App. xvii, p. 4442 Ath. Oxon. (ed. 1721), i. f. 105.

3 Register, f. 29b.

4 Pearson (op. cit.), 233.

say, in 1586, we must leave him some time in which to justify the counts.1

Having realised that he could not overlook the alleged extravagances of the Puritan, Freke would not be long in deciding that the interview should be a formal one in Worcester rather than a more private talk at the castle. Cartwright was not likely to come alone, and a concourse suited the city better than the country; in fact, he " comes attended with such Gentlemen as sided with him." There was a further reason in favour of Worcester, namely, that Freke could summon to his support the resident clergy of his cathedral, and the incident, which is worth recording in the words of the manuscript, turns on their presence or absence.

The honest good Bp: thought to have had the assistance of Dr. Goldsborough and Dr. Lewis two of the Prebendaries of the College of Worcester, but they, whether for fear of Leycester's power, or of y1: own inability shrinked away, under a pretence of being sent for to Hereford, where they were Prebendaries: So the poore Bishop was left alone. But it pleased God, that the very same night that Cartwright came to town, came Dr. Longworth also to the College. As soon as he was come, word was sent to the poore Bp:, which so much revived him, that he became, as it were, a young man again.a . . . The Dr. comforted the good old Bp: and bid him not fear; no man, says he, knows this Cartwright better than myself, we were Fellows of St. Johns College in Cambr: together, and much about one standing.

3

Here, then, is one of our bishops preparing to face the champion of Presbyterianism, and sore afraid of what may happen in the consistory next day. Two of his prebendaries have deserted him, but are worth a glance, even as they "shrink" away. Godfrey Goldsborough,

1 The Baker MS. implies that Lord Leicester was still alive; if so, the incident must have happened before September 4, 1588.

2 The date of his birth is uncertain, but he was not less than seventy at the time.

3 He was equally esteemed in Hartlebury parish; for the churchwardens, though they were not concerned to enter his burial, yet made record in their register (f. 30b): "Edmund Freke the good Lord Bushop of Worcester died the xxjo daie of March, and was buried in the College of Worcester ye xijo daie of Aprill [1591]."