o refrained from going to church without
lawful cause; who had mass-books or super-altars[193] in their
possession;[194] who spoke in contempt of the Book of Common Prayer
and its rites;[195] who caused their children to be baptized with
forms other than those prescribed;[196] ministers who omitted the
cross in baptism;[197] who left off the surplice;[198] who refused to
church women;[199] who called purification "a Jewish ceremony," or who
in their sermons preached seditious doctrine[200]--all these and other
like offenders were indicted at quarter sessions or at the assizes.

CHAPTER II.

PARISH FINANCE.

Speaking generally of the average parish, Elizabethan churchwardens
accounts and vestry minutes show that for the purposes of raising
money amongst themselves to meet every-day parish expenditures,[201]
the parishioners of the period did not commonly resort to rates, if by
"rate" be understood a general assessment of all lands or all goods
alike at a fixed percentage of their revenue or value above a minimum
exempted.

It must not be supposed, however, that in the case of offerings or
gatherings, or of levies to raise a certain sum where each man
assessed himself, it was entirely optional for each to give or to
refuse. What a man customarily gave, or what he had promised to give,
or, again, what the parish thought he ought to give, that the ordinary
might compel him to give.[202] From an offering or a voluntary
assessment to a rate is often but a short step, and the two former
shade off into the latter almost imperceptibly. The justices of the
peace and the ecclesiastical authorities usually cast lump sums upon
the parishes, leaving ways and means to the parishioners themselves.
But it was, of course, optional with the justices to rate each
individual separately when it seemed good to them, and for this they
had the Queen's subsidy books to guide them. Here, however, we are
chiefly concerned with the raising of money amongst the parishioners
themselves. How manifold, how ingenious were the parochial devices for
creating resources, it is the purpose of this chapter to set forth.

But before proceeding to the parish expedients, properly so called,
for raising money, it will be well to say something of parish
endowments, whether in lands, houses or funds. According as the
revenue from these was available for general, or at least for various
purposes, or, on the other hand, was impressed with a trust for some