[56] Warrington Deanery Visit., 189.
[57] Manchester Deanery Visit., 69.
[58] Ibid. Then as now the ale-house was the strongest rival of the House of God. A very common class of offenders were those who would not leave their ale cups to go to service (see authorities cited, passim). Men were also great gossipers ("common talkers") in the churchyard, as a number of presentments show.
[59] Order of the archdeacon, Essex Archdeaconry, to the wardens of St. Peter's and of All Saints. Maldon, in 1577, Hale, Crim. Prec., 158. For refusing to keep her seat in church according to this order Elizabeth Harris was presented the next year, Hale, loc. cit., 171.
[60] The vestry of St. Alphage's (G.B. Hall, Records of St. Alphage, London Wall, 31) grew highly indignant in Aug., 1620, when the business of seating the parishioners came up for discussion, that a Mr. Loveday and his wife should presume to sit "togeather in one pewe and that in the Ile where men vsually doe & ere did sitt; we hould it most ynconvenyent and most vnseemely, And doe thinke it fitt that Mr Chancellor of London be made acquainted wth it [etc]…"
[61] Hale, Crim. Prec., 241-2: "Contra Hayward, puellam. Presentatur, for that she beinge but a yonge mayde, sat in the pewe with her mother, to the greate offence of many reverend women." The child (as the vicar who made the presentment continues should have sat at her mother's "pewe dore." 1617). Cf. Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 122-3 (Janet Foggard cited for that "she beinge a yonge woman, unmarried, will not sit in the stall wher she is appointed …"). Cf. Hale, op. cit., 210 (One Clay and his wife "will not be ordered in church by us the church wardens [etc.]..". 1595).
[62] Examples will be found in the act-books cited supra.
[63] Hale, Crim. Prec., 149 (1566). Cf. ibid., 163 (The divine service not "reverently, plainelye and distinctlye saide…" 1576).
[64] Hale, op. cit., 182 (1584). Cf. Whitgift's Articles for Sarum diocese in 1588, art. viii: "Whether your ministers used to pray for the quenes majestie … by the title and style due to her majestie." Cardwell, Doc. Ann., ii, 14.
[65] Dean of York's Visit., 320 (1596).