The History of Lynn, Vol. 2 [of 2]

by William Richards

Section VI.

Further remarks on the effects of the Reformation, especially as they appeared in this town.

The effects of the reformation were very great and remarkable, not only on those who were rationally proselyted to it, or who received it upon conviction, but also on them who went with the tide without exercising their reason or troubling their heads at all about the comparative merits of the two religions. Neither party had their morals improved, but on the contrary rendered much more dissolute by the change, as we have already seen. The same event had likewise effects no less visible and remarkable on the very aspect or appearance of both town and country; as must necessarily have been the case from the dissolution and demolition of so many religious houses, and the suppression and expulsion of such a multitude of monks, friars, and nuns, who must have had no small influence in preserving social order, regulating the morals, and restraining many of the vicious propensities of the community.

In fact, the licentiousness which appears to have resulted from the reformation is seemingly to be ascribed to the three following causes—1. The real, apparent, or supposed loose tendency of certain leading doctrines of the reformers, as was observed before.—2. The suppression of the religious houses, whose inhabitants used to be the means of promoting public decency, and checking the influence of licentious principles. [668]—3. The revolutionary character of the reformation. All great revolutions, from their very nature, tend to weaken the ties, and loosen the bands which preserve the good order of society and strengthen the moral habits of its members.—It may be reasonably concluded that each of these causes had a material effect on this town and country at the memorable era of reformation, and long after.

We can discover no appearance or indication that the character or disposition of the Lynn people was further christianized, mollified, or any way improved by that extraordinary event; but rather the contrary. Among the principal transactions left upon record as having taken place here since the reformation, one of the first is “the burning of a Dutchman in the Market place for heresy.” This is said to have happened in the year 1335, and so at an early period of our protestantism. It is remarkable enough that the only instance that occurred in this town of putting a man to death for heresy, or burning him for his religion, happened after the reformation, or since the town became protestant; which shews that people may bear that honourable name and at the same time be very far from humanity and righteousness.

The poor hapless sufferer had probably fled to England and made choice of Lynn as a place of refuge from the persecution which then raged in his own country. He might be induced to take this step from the favourable reports he had heard at home of the generosity and hospitality of our nation towards strangers, and particularly the oppressed and friendless. If such was actually the case, he found himself at last miserably disappointed, and learnt by dear bought and bitter experience, that however abundant the liberality and tender mercies of England and of Lynn might be towards some descriptions of oppressed or distressed people, yet that they by no means extended to those called heretics:—an appellation which has too often meant no more than that those branded with it differed from the ruling or predominant party, and were consigned by them to the ill opinion and detestation of the public.

The deplorable fate of this friendless stranger must stamp indelible disgrace on the memory of his brutal murderers? and it shews what little reason Lynn then had to congratulate itself on its change from popery to protestantism. We have no account what the dreadful heresy was, with which this unpitied victim to protestant bigotry and persecution was charged, and for which he suffered. Whatever it was, it could not be very dangerous or alarming; for as he was a foreigner there could be no danger of his disseminating it here among a people of whose language he can be supposed to have little or no knowledge. In short, every feeling heart must be shocked at the aggravated atrocity of this diabolical deed.

It is sad and mortifying enough to think how much this town has been under the influence of religious bigotry and intolerance, and the most pitiful narrowmindedness almost ever since. The harmless Quakers were here imprisoned and cruelly treated, and the Baptists were harassed in the most unjust and shameful manner even after the revolution. Poor creatures, most wrongfully branded with the odious name of witches, were here also for no short period since the reformation, subjected to rigorous prosecutions and capital punishments. These facts are now just glanced at, but shall be more fully related hereafter in the course of the work.

Unfavourable as some of the reformed doctrines undoubtedly were to moral improvement, it cannot be said to be the case with all of them. Some were evidently of the opposite tendency, as were also some of the romish doctrines. But they could not be expected to produce the desired effect unless they were extensively promulgated; and that does not appear to have been the case in this country, at least till a long while after the commencement of the reformation. It was one of the great and glaring defects of the reforming system in England, that it did not provide a sufficient number of religious or public instructors in lieu of those of the old religion who had been suppressed and silenced at the dissolution of the monasteries and other religious houses, or in consequence of their aversion to the new order of things. These are known to have been very numerous, but the number of the reformed ministers, or protestant clergy, who were appointed to succeed them and supply their places as public instructors, appears to have been very inconsiderable; comparatively at least: and, what is not a little remarkable, they were also, for the most part, far less competent than their predecessors for the charge they undertook. In such circumstances, and with such a ministry, it might be expected that vice and licentiousness would increase and abound.

The state of things at Lynn, at, and long after the reformation, does not appear to have been at all favourable to moral and religious improvement. Before that period the town abounded with religious and moral instructors, such as they were, who certainly contributed in no small measure to preserve social order and public decency; and when they were afterwards superseded, their successors did not appear to greater advantage. They were not their superiors in abilities, and they were far inferior to them in number, and probably no less so in the public estimation, and the weight and extent of their influence over the minds of the inhabitants at large, especially those of the middling and lower orders, who constituted the main body or majority of the inhabitants. For among these there did not appear to be many then, as there had been formerly, who were dissatisfied with the old order of things, and anxious for a religious revolution. [672]