The House of Commons in the mean time had not been idle.  To them the questions at issue were unincumbered with theoretic difficulties.  Enormous abuses had been long ripe for dissolution, and there was no occasion to waste time in unnecessary debates.  At such a time, with a House practically unanimous, business could be rapidly transacted, the more rapidly indeed in proportion to its importance.  In six weeks, for so long only the session lasted, the astonished church authorities saw bill after bill hurried up before the Lords, by which successively the pleasant fountains of their incomes would be dried up to flow no longer; or would flow only in shallow rivulets along the beds of the once abundant torrents, The jurisdiction of the spiritual courts was not immediately curtailed, and the authority which was in future to be permitted to convocation lay over for further consideration, to be dealt with in another manner.  But probate duties and legacy duties, hitherto assessed at discretion, were dwarfed into fixed proportions,[238] not to touch the poorer laity any more, and bearing even upon wealth with a reserved and gentle hand.  Mortuaries were shorn of their luxuriance; when effects were small, no mortuary should be required; when large, the clergy should content themselves with a modest share.  No velvet cloaks should be stripped any more from strangers’ bodies to save them from a rector’s grasp;[239] no shameful battles with apparitors should disturb any more the recent rest of the dead.[240] Such sums as the law would permit should be paid thenceforward in the form of decent funeral fees for householders dying in their own parishes, and there the exactions should terminate.[241]

The carelessness of the bishops in the discharge of their most immediate duties obliged the legislature to trespass also in the provinces purely spiritual, and undertake the discipline of the clergy.  The Commons had complained in their petition that the clergy, instead of attending to their duties, were acting as auditors, bailiffs, stewards, or in other capacities, as laymen; they were engaged in trade also, in farming, in tanning, in brewing, in doing anything but the duties which they were paid for doing; while they purchased dispensations for non-residence on their benefices; and of these benefices, in favoured cases, single priests held as many as eight or nine.  It was thought unnecessary to wait for the bishops’ pleasure to apply a remedy here.  If the clergy were unjustly accused of these offences, a law of general prohibition would not touch them.  If the belief of the House of Commons was well founded, there was no occasion for longer delay.  It was therefore enacted[242]—­“for the more quiet and virtuous increase and maintenance of divine service, the preaching and teaching the Word of God with godly and good example, for the better discharge of cures, the maintenance of hospitality, the relief of poor people, the increase of devotion and good