Chapter IX · RELIGION. (continued 2)

It will here be a suitable place to notice briefly a peculiar form of vestry which in the sixteenth century was common in the hundred of Amounderness and recognised as “sworn men.” Preston, Kirkham, Goosnargh, Poulton, St. Michael’s–on–Wyre, Garstang, Lancaster and Ribchester, each had this executive body, though the number varied; but most of the parishes had twenty–four sworn men. The oath taken by these officers was to the effect that they would keep, observe and maintain all ancient customs as far as they agreed with the law of the realm and were for the benefit of the particular parish or chapelry. Their duties were numerous: they levied the rates, elected the parish clerk in some cases, appointed churchwardens, and even laid claim to nominate the vicar, and in a general way they not only looked after the fabric of the church, but regulated its ceremonies and attended to the welfare of the parish. These men were not re–elected annually, as in the case of churchwardens, but, once appointed, they held office for life, unless they left the parish or were disqualified by becoming Nonconformists or other sufficient reason. The best men in the parish often were included in the list, and in many cases sons succeeded fathers for several generations.205

During the years immediately preceding the Civil Wars, Puritanism had gone on increasing, and at the opening of the Long Parliament, in 1640, it was felt that some change in the form of religious worship had become an absolute necessity to meet the clamorous demands heard on all sides. Lancashire, just as it had for long been a stronghold of Catholicism, now became a centre of Puritanism; and for many years to come the intolerant spirit of both parties helped to retard the progress of free religious thought.

Parliament distinctly for some time fostered Puritanism, which ultimately led to the adoption of the Presbyterian form of Church government, which was developed between the years 1643 and 1648. A modern writer206 truly remarks that, “If Puritanism anywhere had scope to live and act, it was here” (in Lancashire); “if anywhere in England it was actually a force, it was in Lancashire. There is no other part of England that can furnish so complete an illustration of the true spirit of this seventeenth–century Puritanism as it was manifested in actual practice, and it is this that gives such a peculiar value to the records of the religious life of the county during the years 1643–60.”

The actual change of Church government did not much affect the county, until the Assembly at Westminster replaced the Book of Common Prayer by the Directory; this was effected on January 3, 1645, when it was sanctioned by Parliament: other orders rapidly followed. Altars, raised Communion–tables, images, pictures, organs, and “all superstitious inscriptions” were soon swept away, and the energies of the Presbyterian party became concentrated against the clergy, the churches, and their endowment. In 1646 the titles of archbishops and bishops were abolished, and their possessions placed in the hands of trustees, and not long afterwards the “title, dignity, function, and office” of dean, sub–dean, and dean and chapter were done away with. Under the Act for providing maintenance of preachers, passed in 1649, the issues of Church livings were employed to pay preachers appointed by Parliament or the presbytery. The Church Survey of the Lancashire parochial districts was begun in June, 1650, and from it we learn the state of each parish through the evidence brought before the commissioners, who had sixteen sittings in the county; they met three times at Manchester, six at Wigan, three at Lancaster, three at Preston, and once at Blackburn. There were then in the county 64207 parish churches, 118 chapels–of–ease, of which no less than 38 were without ministers, chiefly for want of maintenance. All the churches, with one or two exceptions, had curates, pastors, or ministers, as they called themselves. The parishes in many instances were said to be very large, and subdivision was recommended, whilst some of the chapels were so far from the mother church that it was suggested that they should be made into parish churches.

The survey furnishes the names of all the ministers, and their fitness or otherwise for the office they held; as most of them were said to be “godly preaching ministers,” or were “of good lyfe and conversation, but keept not the fast–days appointed by Parliament,” it may safely be inferred that the old vicars and curates had mostly either conformed or been superseded by the then holders of the livings. On September 13, 1646, a petition was sent to both Houses of Parliament, styled “The humble petition of many thousand of the well–affected gentlemen, ministers, freeholders, and other inhabitants of the county palatine of Lancaster.” This petition set forth that, “through the not settling of Church government, schism, error, heresy, profaneness, and blasphemy woefully spread”; separate congregations being “erected and multiplied, sectaries grew insolent, confidently expecting a toleration.” The petitioners then go on in the true spirit of those times to pray that some speedy course should betaken “for suppressing of all separate congregations of Anabaptists, Brownists, heretics, schismatics, blasphemers, and other sectaries” which refused to submit to “discipline and government,” and, further, that such “refusers and members of such congregations” should not only be removed from, but kept out of “all places of public trust.” Shortly after this (October 2, 1646) the county was divided into nine classical presbyteries, as follows:

1. The parishes of Manchester, Prestwich, Oldham, Flixton, Eccles, and Ashton–under–Lyne. The members nominated consisted of eight ministers and seventeen laymen.208

2. The parishes of Bolton, Bury, Middleton, Rochdale, Deane, and Radcliffe. Its members, ten ministers and twenty laymen.

3. The parishes of Whalley, Chipping, and Ribchester. Its members, eight ministers and seventeen laymen.

4. The parishes of Warrington, Winwick, Leigh, Wigan, Holland, and Prescot. Its members, fourteen ministers and twenty–eight laymen.

5. The parishes of Walton, Huyton, Childwall, Sefton, Alcar, North Meols, Halsall, Ormskirk, and Aughton. Its members, fifteen ministers and twenty–three laymen.

6. The parishes of Croston, Leyland, Standish, Ecclestone, Penwortham, Hoole, and Brindle. Its members, six ministers and fourteen laymen.

7. The parishes of Preston, Kirkham, Garstang, and Poulton.209 Its members, six ministers and thirteen laymen.

8. The parishes of Lancaster, Cockerham, Claughton, Melling, Tatham, Tunstall, Whittington, Warton, Bolton–le–Sands, Halton, and Heysham. Its members, eight ministers and eighteen laymen.

9. The parishes of Aldingham, Urswick, Ulverston, Hawkshead, Colton, Dalton, Cartmel, Kirkby, and Pennington. Its members, five ministers and eleven laymen.

The names of all these members have many times been printed. It does not necessarily follow that all the persons nominated as “fit to be of” each classis absolutely acted in that capacity; indeed, it is well known that many refused the office.

These classes at once took upon them the management and control of things ecclesiastical. The Manchester classis first met on February 16, 1646/7, when Richard Heyricke, the Warden of the collegiate church, was appointed Moderator, although he had formerly been one of the warmest supporters of the Church and King; at their second meeting, on March 16, 1646/7, they passed a resolution to the effect that all who preached within the classis who were not members of it were to be called to account, as were also all ministers or others who permitted them so to preach. A considerable part of the time of the successive meetings was taken up by the inquiry into cases of immoral conduct and social scandals affecting the members of the various congregations: candidates for the ministry were examined by the Presbyters of each classis, and, if approved, were duly ordained; and it was also part of their work to see that improper persons were not admitted to the Lord’s Supper.

From two remarkable papers, signed by a large number of the Lancashire ministers, in 1648 and 1649, we gather something of the spirit of the age. One of these is “the Harmonious Consent of the Ministers of the Province within the County–Palatine of Lancaster, etc., in their testimony to the truth of Jesus Christ and to our solemn League and Covenant; as also against the errours, heresies, and blasphemies of these times and the toleration of them”; the other is, “The Paper called the Agreement of the People taken into consideration, and the lawfulness of Subscription to it examined and resolved in the negative, by Ministers of Christ in the Province of Lancaster, etc.” In the “Harmonious Consent”210 toleration is thus dealt with: “We are here led to express with what astonishment and horrour we are struck when we seriously weigh what endeavours are used for the establishing of an universal toleration of all the pernicious errours, blasphemies, and heretical doctrines broached in these times, as if men would not sin fast enough except they were bidden”; such a toleration, it is urged, would be “a giving Satan full liberty to set up his thresholds by God’s thresholds and his posts by God’s posts, his Dagon by God’s Ark”; and further, “it would be putting a sword in a madman’s hand, a cup of poyson into the hand of a child, a letting loose of madmen with firebrands in their hands, an appointing a city of refuge for the devil to fly to, a laying of a stumbling block before the blind, a proclaiming of liberty to the wolves to come into Christ’s fold to prey upon his lambs; a toleration of soul–murther (the greatest murther of all others), and for the establishing whereof damned souls in hel would accurse men on earth.” The petitioners also dreaded “to think what horrid blasphemies would be belched out against God, what vile abominations would be committed, how the duties of nearest relatives would be violated”; they then express their opinion that “the establishing of a toleration would make us to become the abhorring and loathing of all nations,” and after adding the words, “we do detest the forementioned toleration,” they conclude by praying that Parliament may be kept from “being guilty of so great a sin” as the granting of it would be.

This petition was signed by eighty–four ministers who had in their charge the principal parishes in the county. The other paper is quite as rabid in its tone, and bears the signature of nearly as many divines as the “Harmonious Consent.” It sets forth clearly the points at issue, one of which was that it was proposed that “such as profess faith in God by Jesus Christ (however differing in judgement from the doctrine, worship or discipline publiquely held forth) shall not be restrained from, but shall be protected in their profession of their faith and exercise of religion, according to their consciences.” To this proposition the minister of the province of Lancaster exclaims: “Thus all damnable heresies, doctrines of devils, idolatrous, superstitious and abominable religions, that ever have been broached, or practised, or can be devised (if the persons owning them will but profess faith in God by Jesus Christ) are set at liberty in this kingdom; nay, not only granted toleration, but enfranchisement, yea, protection and patronage.”

We now find practically all the churches and chapels in the hands of the Presbyterians, and governed by the various classes, which met periodically at central places. These classes sent delegates to attend the provincial synod which met at Preston twice a year. In little less than three years after the formation of these classes difficulties arose in their working, not only because some places, such as Denton, Salford and Oldham, became disaffected, but in other places several members declined to continue their membership. A great cause of division amongst the various congregations was the conduct of the ministers and elders as to the admission of communicants. Oliver Heywood gives an account of the proceedings on this point at Bolton; he says: “There were two ministers, with whom were associated twelve elders, chosen out of the parish. These sat with the ministers, carried their votes into effect, inquired into the conversation of their neighbours, assembled usually with the ministers when they examined communicants, and though the ministers only examined, yet the elders approved or disapproved. These together made an order that every communicant, as often as he was to partake of the Lord’s Supper, should come to the ruling elders on the Friday before, and request and receive a ticket which he was to deliver up to the elders immediately before his partaking of that ordinance. The ticket was of lead, with a stamp upon it, and the design was that they might know that none intruded themselves without previous permission. The elders went through the congregation and took the tickets from the people, and they had to fetch them again by the next opportunity, which was every month. But this became the occasion of great dissension in the congregations, for several Christians stumbled at it, and refused to come for tickets; yet ventured to sit down, so that when the elders came they had no tickets to give in.”

This state of things was not confined to a single parish, but was widespread, so that in some churches, rather than administer the Sacrament “promiscuously,” the minister declined to administer it at all, and it was in a few places suspended for several years.

Whatever may be said as to the general dogmatical and narrow–minded views of the Lancashire Puritan clergy, they certainly did make great efforts to institute and maintain a high moral tone amongst their flocks. The every–day life of each member was subjected to rigid inquisitorial supervision, and his sins were dealt with in no half–hearted manner, excommunication being a frequent punishment, and even after the offender’s death a funeral sermon was preached and the “occasion improved.” Lancashire is fortunate in having had preserved several of the diaries of her Puritan divines, and these all bear strong testimony to the almost childlike faith which these men held as to the special interference of Providence in the events of everyday life. If a minister was to be tried at Lancaster, God graciously took away the judge by death; if he journeyed to London, the weather was specially arranged to suit; and if anyone was more than ordinarily rebellious against the Church’s discipline and he thereabouts died, it was without the slightest hesitation attributed to a special judgment of God. We have seen with what signs of rejoicing the people of Lancashire (see p. 157) welcomed the restoration of Charles II. The country had got tired of the Commonwealth, and as to the religious feeling, the Episcopalians and Presbyterians were alike glad to have a return to the old form of government; yet the old rancour against Papists was still there, and to it was added a hatred of Anabaptists, Quakers and Independents: against the latter the Puritans were specially exercised.

The passing of the Act of Uniformity in 1662 put the clergy of the county to a severe test, the result being that sixty–seven of them refused to conform, and were summarily ejected from their livings. This act of injustice led to the commencement of Nonconformity in Lancashire, for amongst the ejected were many zealous and pious men, who through honest conviction could not conform to all the conditions required, and were not willing to abandon the views which they held.

Amongst these were Nathaniel Heywood, John Angier, Harry Newcome, Henry Pendlebury, Isaac Ambrose, Robert Bath, Richard Mather, John Harrison, and many others, all of whom soon had around them the nucleus of a future congregation. At first these men preached in private houses with impunity, but the passing of the Conventicle Act and the Five Mile Act, and the presence of large numbers of Roman Catholics, pressed hard upon them, and the amount of persecution and suffering which followed was extreme. For the next few years Nonconformists were persecuted with a vindictiveness worthy of the Dark Ages. Surrounded with spies on every hand, they were driven to hold secret meetings in out–of–the–way places, where they often met in the night–time. Those who were most zealous, or the most careless of discovery, were often apprehended at once, marched off to Lancaster, and sometimes, as in the case of Thomas Jolley (ejected from Altham), detained nearly twelve months in prison.

Perhaps no sect suffered more severely in Lancashire than the Quakers, who took no care to hide their meetings, and from them not only were fines enforced and goods sold, but many of them were for long periods locked up in gaol with felons and other criminal prisoners. Dr. Halley211 says that although “their sufferings were cruelly severe, it must be acknowledged that they provoked much of the persecution which they so patiently endured, and repelled the assistance which good men of other parties would have been ready to afford them. A modern Friend, mild, pleasant, neatly dressed, carefully educated, perfected in proprieties, is as unlike as possible, except in a few principles, to the obtrusive, intolerant, rude, coarse, disputatious Quaker of the early days of their sect.” The Society of Friends may almost be said to have arisen in Lancashire, so great was the support which it received here in the days of its infancy. In 1652 George Fox made a visit to Swarthmore Hall, near Ulverston, when he made a convert of the young wife of Judge Fell, and by their united efforts they soon obtained a considerable number of followers in the district of Furness and Cartmel, whose sympathies were no doubt quickened by the knowledge of the cruel persecutions of these “children of the light” (as they were sometimes called) constantly being enacted in Lancaster Castle. Margaret Fell, after the judge’s death, became the wife of George Fox, and she was subsequently the writer of several treatises, and journeyed to London to deliver a copy of one of them to the King. The Lancashire Quaker literature of the seventeenth century is remarkable not only for the quantity of it, but for the light it throws on the religious thought of those writers for and against the teachings of the early pioneers of the sect.212

Of the cruel persecutions to which many of this sect in Lancashire were subjected, many examples might be cited; indeed, at one time the castle at Lancaster was said to be almost full of them, that town being one of their centres. In November, 1660, the Quakers of Lancaster, being assembled at one of their meetings, were surprised by a party of soldiers, who entered the room where they were with “drawn swords and pistols cockt,” and took the whole of them prisoners. A Lancaster Quaker called John Lawson, in 1652, was seized at Malpas (in Cheshire), where he had been preaching in what he called “the Steeple House213 Yard.” He was set in the stocks for four hours, and afterwards imprisoned for twenty–three weeks; but shortly after his release he repeated the offence in the Lancaster churchyard, for which at the assizes he was fined £20 or in default one year’s imprisonment; and again in 1660 he was sent a prisoner to the castle for refusing to take the oath tendered to him in court. Another example of the treatment which the early converts in Lancashire to this sect met with is found in the case of John Fielden, of Inchfield, near Todmorden, who in 1664 was fined £5 for attending a Quakers’ meeting, and his goods were seized by the churchwarden and sold to pay the church–rate. In 1668 he was kept in prison thirty–one weeks for being absent from church, and this kind of persecution continued until he was quite an old man, as seventeen years later we find him in Preston House of Correction, where he was retained for eight weeks, the offence being his having attended a meeting of the Society of Friends at Padiham. Very many similar cases might be quoted.

In 1689 the Toleration Act was passed, which recognised all the various forms of Dissent, which now became entitled to a place amongst the religious institutions of the county.

No time was now lost in establishing meeting–houses all over the county, and in almost every parish there soon arose Presbyterian or Independent chapels; many of the former ultimately passed to the Unitarians.

From a list prepared for Dr. Evans in 1715, it would appear that there were then in Lancashire forty–three Presbyterian and Independent congregations, consisting of 18,310 regular hearers; and that in Manchester there were 1,515 Dissenters, in Liverpool 1,158, in Bolton 1,094, and in Chowbent 1,064. Bishop Gastrell,214 writing a little later, reports that in Rochdale there were no Papists, but about 200 Dissenters, who had a meeting–house; Bolton he puts down as having only 400 Dissenters, and to Manchester he gives 233 Dissenting families.

Many of these early chapels have interesting histories, which cannot be dealt with here.215 Amongst the oldest ones may be named the following: Elswick Chapel, in the parish of St. Michael’s–on–Wyre, was built as a sort of chapel–of–ease to the parish–church, by a party of Presbyterians a little before 1650, and a minister appointed by the classis. At the Restoration it was probably vacated; but in 1671–72 it was duly licensed as a place to be used for such as did not conform to the Church of England, who were “of the persuasion commonly called Congregational”. Shortly after this an Act was passed repealing this and similar licenses, whereupon the meeting at Elswick became illegal, and the chapel was closed until the passing of the Act of Toleration in 1689, since which time it has been regularly used as a Nonconformist chapel. At Wymondhouses a small chapel was built by the Rev. Thomas Jolley (who was ejected from Altham) in 1689. The chapel of the Presbyterians at Cockey Moor was one which obtained a license in 1672. The first Dissenting chapel in Manchester was in Cross Street; it was built in 1672 for the congregation of the Rev. Henry Newcome. This chapel was destroyed in 1714 (see p. 242). The Independents had no chapel in Manchester until 1761, when the one in Cannon Street was erected.

Toxteth Park or Dingle Chapel, near Liverpool, existed certainly in the early part of the seventeenth century, and is believed to have been built by the Puritans living in the district. Richard Mather (the grandfather of Dr. Cotton Mather) was for some time minister here, but was silenced by the Archbishop of York in 1633, and his successor was a Conformist, who was probably removed by the Presbyterian classis, 1646; in 1671–72 it was licensed under the Indulgence Act. From this congregation arose the Renshaw Street Unitarian Chapel in Liverpool216 about the year 1687. Meeting–houses, as they were called, were established in almost every town under the Indulgence Act, and in most cases before the close of the century regular chapels were erected.

The Society of Friends, notwithstanding the persecution to which they were subjected, began to build meeting–houses even before the indulgences were granted. At Lancaster a Quakers’ meeting–house was erected in 1677, at which time there was no other Nonconformist place of worship in the town.

A few years later the Mayor found it necessary to place a guard at the door of the house to prevent a meeting being held. In 1708 this meeting–house was found to be small, and a much larger one was erected. The meeting–house at Swarthmoor was built in 1686 upon land given by George Fox, who also endowed it with land free from tithes, so that (to quote his letter) “Friends may be sure of a meeting–house for ever that is free and will maintain itself, and which is the Lord’s.” In this meeting–house is still preserved George Fox’s folio Bible, to which is attached the chain with which it was formerly fastened to the pulpit. The number of meeting–houses of the Society of Friends was never very great in Lancashire, and in the larger towns there were very few built before the early part of the eighteenth century. Most of them had graveyards attached, and in some cases (as in Manchester) these remain, whilst the meeting–houses have been pulled down.

Wesley made many visits to all parts of Lancashire; but the growth of Methodism was at first slow in the county, as it met with much opposition from many quarters, and in several towns the appearance of its founder led to disorder and riots. Methodism began in a very humble way in Lancashire, the handful of converts forming themselves into “classes,” and often meeting in small cottages. In Manchester the first gatherings were held in a small room in a house near the Irwell, where a woman lived, having in the room her spinning–wheel, her coals, her bed, chair and table. Some of the earlier societies (about the year 1744) were called “William Darney’s societies.” Another man who assisted Wesley in Lancashire was John Bennet of Derbyshire, who introduced Wesleyanism into Rochdale a little before 1746.

Methodism was not introduced into Preston until 1750, and in some districts it did not obtain a footing until a much later period; but long before the close of the century its chapels were found in almost every large town as well as in isolated rural districts.

Early in the seventeenth century Baptist chapels were erected in several parts of the county. Of the many sects which have arisen within the last hundred years, it is not our province to record either the origin or progress, as Lancashire, in common with all the country, has now inhabitants who worship under many forms; but there no longer exists that bitter, antagonistic feeling between one denomination and another which has for so many centuries been a blot upon the pages of England’s history.

In 1819 there were in Lancashire 77 Roman Catholic chapels, and in 1823 the Dissenting chapels included: 68 Independent, 27 Baptist, 32 Unitarian, 4 Scotch Kirk, 3 Scotch Presbyterian, and 180 Wesleyan.