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CHAPTER VII

 

There having been many and long contests between the Church of Norwich and the Town of Yarmouth about the rights of the Rectory, which is appropriated to the said Church, the naming of the Curate, the repairing of the Chancel and some other particulars. The Dean brought all these matters to a full composure with them, by letting them a lease of the said Rectory whereby the Rent is reserved to the said Church, the Herbage, Lactuage. offerings and surplice fees to the Curate and all other dues of the said Rectory are granted to the said Town of Yarmouth. As to the Curate it is agreed that the Town shall have the recommendation of him on all vacancys and the Church the approbation and the nomination of him to the Bishops and in lieu of this and other grants of the said Lease the said Town do discharge them of the repair of the Chancell and a composition of £10 per annum in lieu of a customary breakfast, formerly given to all the fishermen of Yarmouth on the morning next after Christmas Day, upon which agreement it is hoped a foundation is laid for a lasting peace between the two corporations.

 

About this time great application was made to the Dean in the behalf of some popish Gentry who would gladly be permitted to dwell in the Close, but he would never consent hereto. The Dean and chapter having formerly found great inconvenience from having such neighbours in the Close, have for many years past, in all the leases of the houses in the Close, inserted a clause binding the tenants under the penalty of forfeiture not to admit any recusant to dwell or surjourn in any of the said houses, this they would have the Dean dispense with for the sake of the persons in whose behalf it was desired but the Dean would not suffer himself to be prevailed on by any solicitations in this matter, especially since he had sufficient reason to suspect that the chief aim of this solicitation was to introduce a Popish Priest into the Close through the popish familys that were desirous to settle there which the Dean would never endure. This very much angered that party so that not long after the Duke of Norfolk coming to Norwich, and bringing his mother and mother-in-law with him, these ladies expressed themselves in . very bitter terms against the Dean on this act, which confirmed him in his suspicions that they had other designs by desiring to come into the Close than barely to have a dwelling there, otherwise the disappointment could not have deserved so great a resentment.

 

The maintenance of the Parochial Clergy of Norwich depending mostly upon arbitrary contributions gathered from door to door in every parish, it was in the year 1706 endeavoured to bring it to a fixed certainty by Act of Parliament, in order whereto a Petition from the City being necessary the Mayor, Aldermen and Common Council were solicited to make the said Petition, and while this was in agitation for the furthering the success hereof, Dr. Prideaux published an award made by King Charles the First and passed under his broad seal for the settling of 2 shillings of the pound out of the rents of all ground, buildings and edifices within the said City of Norwich for the said Parochial Clergy, to which he annexed a discourse for the Vindicating of the legality and justice and reasonableness of the said award, wherein he especially treats of the nature and legality of personal Tythes and the manner of paying them in the City of London and although the end for which he first published this treatise was not then obtained, yet hoping it might some time hereafter operate thereto, he caused it again to be reprinted among his Ecclesiastical Tracts An 1716.

 

About this time the right which the minor Canons and other ministers and officers of the Cathedral Church of Norwich claimed of giving their votes in the election of Parliament men for the County ot Norwich as freeholders of the said County by virtue of the houses which they hold with their places in the said Church within the precincts of the same being much called in question and argued against, Dr. Prideaux in order to direct the consciences of those who were under his care and government thought it his duty to get for them the best information that could be had for which purpose he obtained the opinion of several eminent Lawyers, especially of Sir J.Holt who was Lord Chief Justice of England concerning this matter, who all agreeing that by the Charter of Incorporation being made as one person they could have but one freehold in all that they were possessed of within the said City and Country by virtue of the said Charter, and consequently could have but one vote among them all, and that this freehold and the right of giving this vote was solely in the Dean and Chapter to whom the said Charter was granted and that as to the houses which the said minor Canons and other ministers and Officers of the said Church held by virtue of their places, they have only the use of them by virtue of their local status of the Church under the said Dean and Chapter to whom the freehold of them did wholly belong. The Dean called the said minor Canons and the other ministers and officers of the said Church together, and communicated this opinion unto them. But they being greedy of having this right of voting to belong to them by virtue of the houses which they said they held during life persisted in their claim of it. Whereon the Dean, having drawn up a State of the case procured it to be laid before the said Summers with a request for his Opinion, thereon hoping this from so great a man would carry that authority therewith as finally to determine the case and make all to acquiesce therein. And the Opinion which he was pleased to give on this case as written from his mouth by Mr. Martin then his Chaplain and one of the Prebendarys of the said Church was as followeth.

 

That he thinks the whole revenues of the Church are vested in the Body Corporate and therefore it seems hard to conceive how the several members who compose that Corporation should have a distinct personal right of voting. And he said that therefore particularly upon Friday the 2nd of May 1624, which was in the 21st year of King James the First it was determined in the House of Commons that the several members of such Corporations had not a right of voting upon account of what the Corporation was seised of. But he said that there hath been a great alteration in the determinations of the House of Commons since that time. And that the same day before mentioned there were two other Resolutions made which have since beenjudged there quite otherwise. That since the contests about elections have been so great, the House of Commons have generally seemed to affect to increase the number of electors, that he looked upon the questions proposed to be a matter of very great consequence as concerning not only all the Cathedrals of the new foundations, but very many other corporate bodies and he was apprehensive that the stirring sucha doubt would be ill taken by many and might occasion a great deal of clamour and perhaps great inconveniences. And therefore as a friend his advice was rather to let things remain quiet, and leave every particular person to act in this matter as he shall think fit himself. He added further that he believed that as things had been of late carried in the House of Commons, it would be found difficult to prevail which Lawyers to give Opinions in such a manner as would be of any great use to the Enquirers. And that nothing but his personal respects to the Dean and his confidence that no wrong use would be made of what he had said would have engaged him to have spoken so largely about this matter.

 

Sir Nathan Wright who had been Lord Keeper of the broad seal after the Lord Somers having a son at that time one of the prebendarys of the Church of Norwich, the Dean prevailed with him to lay the case before his father, and produced his Opinion upon it, who very freely and fully gave it that no member of the Church by virtue of his house or any other part of the Revenues of the Church annexed to his place in the same could have a right of voting as a freeholder in any election but that the freehold of the whole was vested in the Corporate body, and that therefore as there could be but one freehold in all of it, there could be no more than the right of one vote for the same. And this Mr. Wright declared before all the ministers and officers of the Church then met together in the Chapter House to be his father's opinion who had the reputation of being one of the best Common Lawyers in the Kingdom.

 

None being admitted in the election of Parliament men to vote as a freeholder without taking the freeholders Oath, whereby he swears that he is so, the Dean's chief concern in all this matter was to keep those who were under his care and government from being perjured. And therefore from al these opinions being fully convinced that no member of the Church by reason of his house or any other part of its revenues which by virtue of his place he stands possessed of in it, can claim to be a freeholder, or with a safe conscience swear that he is so in any election, he thought it his duty to advise them accordingly hereto. And therefore on the approach of the next election after, having called together the minor Canons and the other ministers and officers of the Church, he communicated to them the Opinion above mentioned, and thereon earnestly advised them to act accordingly hereto and not make themselves guilty of the great sin of perjury in swearing themselves freeholders where they were not so. That were it only a moot case he thought they could not safely swear to it, much less when there were such opinions against it. But the ultimate decision of this matter belonging to the House of Commons and their Committee of Elections he would not run the danger of embarassing himself with them by meddling . any further with it he had procured for them the best information and advice of Law that could be had in this case, and had faithfully communicated it to them, and in doing thus much having discharged his conscience he would therefore leave it to them to look to theirs, and meddle no further with it, only he could not but add that if they continued still to give their votes as formerly, some time or other the election would bear upon them and then the validity of those votes would be called in question and if Judgement should go against them and any of them should thereby become convicted of perjury, they might assure themselves that in case this happened in his time he would not suffer any of them with the blot of so foul a guilt upon them to continue members of the Church where he is Dean and whoever should succeed him he believed would be of the same mind.

 

In the year 1707, the Bishopric of Ely falling void by the death of Bishop Patrick, Dr. Moor was translated thither from Norwich and Dr. Trimwell one of the prebendarys of Norwich was made Bishop of that See in his stead. From the translation of Bishop Moor to the naming of his successor for Norwich near an half year having intervened, Dr. Prideaux during this vacancy had several letters sent him to excite and encourage him to put in for the Bishopric, but he could by no means be prevailed on so to do, neither did he think it for his interest to accept of it should it be offered to him. His Deanry and Archdeaconry of Suffolk, without reckoning his poor Vicarage of Trowse, one year with another brought him in £400 per annum which would better support him in the station he was then in than four times that sum could in the Bishopric of Norwich, especially since the coming into that Bishopric what in first fruits, not in fees and not in providing an Equipage furnishing the Palace and removing to it cannot cost less than two thousand pounds, which must be all again saved out of the revenues of the Bishopric and if the Bishop die in the mean interim his family must suffer by it. There are instances where Bishops dying too soon after their promotion have left their familys in that poverty as to need charity for their necessary subsistence. This was the case of Bishop Womock, and this was the case of Bishop Grove, and this would have been the case of Archbishop Tillotson, but that his widow after his death was helped by a pension from the Crown, and the booksellers giving her £2000 for those sermons of his which were first published after his death. Dr. Prideaux was indeed in no danger of leaving any behind him in this distress, by reason of a Temporal estate of his own of several hundreds per annum which would sufficiently secure him from this, how soon soever he might happen to die, however he was loath to run the hazard of damaging his inheritance and leaving it diminished for the sake of a gilded pill, such the major part of the Bishoprics of England truly are, they glitter in the outer show, but leave bitterness in your mouth when taken down. It doth not cost the Gentleman of the Law above £50 to be placed and settled in the highest Stations of their profession, whereas if a poor clergyman be called to a Bishopric he is eaten up with first fruits and fees before he can be settled in it. He was of Opinion that when the Parliament discharged all small livings not exceeding £50 per annum of all tenths and first fruits, they had done much better if they had at the same time also discharged all poor Bishoprics of the same payments that is all not exceeding a thousand pounds per annum, there being as cogent reasons for the one as for the other, considering the attendance of Parliament and other expensive ways of living that are annexed to their office, and it was in his opinion to be further wished that instead of the mock election of Bishops by longe d'elire and the operose way of sueing out so many instruments and going through so many offices and there paying so many fees for them in order to that full settlement, in the promotions, Bishops were made here in the same manner as they are in Ireland by the King's letters patents to present them to the Benefice as in the case of all other Ecclesiastical Benefices in the King's gift and his mandate to the Archbishop to consecrate Institute and Install them. This would save a great deal of trouble and charge and deliver Deans and Chapters from the great danger of a praemunire which they are liable to in all such elections, if they do not within 20 days return elected the person whom in his letters missive the King shall nominate unto them, these alterations would make those promotions much more desirable than now they are.

 

But that which made Dr. Prideaux most averse to the pursuing the proposal above mentioned for the Bishopric of Norwich was that he was very easy in the Deanry which he could not promise himself to be in a Bishopric, in the former he was in a sphere where by reason of his long experience in the business of the Cathedral Church, he could act to the full of its extent, which he saw reason to fear he could not do in the other especially since now the attending the Court of the Parliament and affairs of state, are made so much the business of a Bishop which he knew himself to be wholly unacquainted with and desired to continue so to be, and therefore instead of making any interest for himself on this occasion, he engaged all that he had for Dr. Trimnell whom he knew to be an honest good man, and well deserving of this promotion which the Diocese had afterwards full experience of to their great satisfaction.

 

In the year 1708 he purchased the Manner of Owby near Yarmouth which is to the value of — per annum [ figure not given ], this with what he had before in the Close in Norwich, Horning in Norfolk, Helmingham and Thornham in Suffolk, he made up to the value of — per annum [ figure not given ] which was not gotten out of the Church, for his Church preferments never maintained him till he had the Deanry, but was his own and his wife's inheritance and the improvements which his good management made of both. His own estate was in Cornwall but this being at too great a distance to be well looked after, he sould it and bought in Norfolk, that being the Country where providence had placed him.

 

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