On a June evening in 1617 Edward Perceval was reading the Prayer Book service in the Pennine chapel of Saddleworth, when Richard Wrigley burst in through the chancel door and cried out ‘hark, hark, come this way, for we will have a sermon of our own’. He urged the people to join him at the upper end of the chapel yard, where a godly preacher was waiting.Footnote ¹ The inhabitants were thus faced with the decision of whether to remain in their pews for the set liturgy or to follow Wrigley outside – a division described in the subsequent court deposition as the cause of grief to ‘well affected people’. The division and conflict experienced at Saddleworth were not, however, apparent everywhere. A few miles further east, godly preaching was also happening in a chapel yard. Throughout the summer of 1620 the inhabitants of Sowerby assembled around their elderly minister, John Broadley, as he delivered his sermons from the dial stone. This was necessary because the chapel was being partially demolished and rebuilt on a larger scale to accommodate the growing number of worshippers. Broadley had reputedly ‘broken through full many a hart of stone’ with his plain preaching, which was pertinent to his hearers and full of practical applications and uses.Footnote ² Broadley's popularity and renown led to him becoming the subject of a local legend: that during his three months of outdoor preaching he was not once disturbed by a drop of rain.Footnote ³ A minor miracle indeed in this hill country.

The events at Saddleworth and Sowerby paint very different pictures of the impact of godly preaching on a small community. The drama of preaching as a source of conflict, however, tends to obscure the existence of successful preaching ministries in communities that were no more divided than they ever were. There is no doubt that the arrival of a Calvinist preacher could cause conflict and social fracturing, but this was not inevitable and the alternative story of how late Reformation preaching ministers could be successful in a pastoral setting is becoming better understood. The abundance of contemporary advice on how to preach reveals the ideal that ministers should consider their hearers’ needs, while manuscript copies of sermons show how this aim could be put into practice.Footnote ⁴ Likewise, the view from the pew – or at least those occupying the front pew – provided by sermon notes, diaries and wills, reveals a cohort of Protestants who appreciated sermons and who had the opportunity to create textual records of that appreciation. However, what the laity seated or standing further back in the church thought about preaching remains less clear. Although there is a good case for arguing a wide engagement with reformed religion more generally, when preaching has been the particular focus, the discontent of the few who found themselves in the ecclesiastical courts still looms disproportionately large.Footnote ⁵ Obtaining a more balanced view usually means inferring from sources that can indicate the priorities of a parish, such as churchwardens’ accounts. The accounts for parishes such as Sheffield, Halifax and Wakefield demonstrate a substantial investment in the fabric associated with hearing sermons during the Jacobean period.Footnote ⁶ The naves of these churches were filled with pews and lofts that were focused towards expensive pulpits, while chancels were either filled with pews or partitioned off as separate rooms.Footnote ⁷ However, although these accounts indicate that preaching was a priority, the regular and well-established nature of parish incomes limits them as an indicator of popular attitudes. In contrast, the less secure income at the sub-parish level of the chapelry meant that any religious investment demanded fresh initiatives and positive choices. The records generated by these choices shed light on the religious attitudes of those who were not able to express their views individually.

From the late medieval period onwards, the geographically large parishes of the South Pennines had been served by chapels-of-ease.Footnote ⁸ The relationship between the chapel and mother parish was not always well-defined and by the late sixteenth century a scarcity of funding meant that many of the chapels had fallen into disuse and disrepair. However, from the last years of that century onwards, this decline was more than reversed with a new phase of chapel building and restoration. At least thirty-four chapels were built, restored or substantially extended in the South Pennines during the period 1590–1660. This was partly a practical response to a rising population, but a key feature of the new and renovated chapels was their configuration to accommodate the hearing of sermons. Traditionally, a focus on testamentary evidence has presented this ecclesiological expansion as the charitable impulse of wealthy individuals.Footnote ⁹ A wider selection of sources, however, shows that this was only part of the picture and that there was a significant collective aspect to bringing the Word to a locality.

In 1613 Sir Walter Stanhope initiated a plan to extend the chapel in his village of Horsforth and install a preaching minister there.Footnote ¹⁰ He and eight other men signed a document committing themselves to the project. An assessment of freeholders was organised to raise funds for the building works, with thirty-five individuals contributing between £1 and £10 each. This was followed by a second assessment entitled ‘what everyone is ratide to paye to the new stipende or wage towardes a preacher at the chapell’. More than ninety individuals were included in this second assessment, with the average contribution being just a few shillings. At the lower end there were at least fifteen contributions of just 8d., indicating the inclusion of poorer inhabitants. The work of bringing godly preaching to Horsforth thus spread from an individual to a small group, then to the freeholders, then to most of settled society. The same spreading participation also occurred on the other side of the Pennines when a new chapel was built at Salford within the parish of Manchester in 1635. The intention of creating a space for hearing sermons was clear from the start, and indeed the first two ministers to serve at Salford were Richard Hollingworth and Thomas Case, both renowned preachers.Footnote ¹¹ A wealthy clothier, Humphrey Booth, had donated the land, but the building costs were met by thirty-five individuals, who contributed between £2 and £20 each. Significantly, a further £39 was collected from ‘sundry other contributions given too small to be particularised’. As with Horsforth, participation spread out beyond the wealthier inhabitants.Footnote ¹²

So, if a wide cross-section of society could be involved with bringing preaching to their locality, how willing was this participation? To start with, it is worth noting that assessments were a generally accepted means of fundraising.Footnote ¹³ Stanhope expressed this assumption when he declared that the assessment at Horsforth had been organised ‘thinking all the saide inhabitance would have therunto consented’.Footnote ¹⁴ However, participation was also conditional on certain expectations, such as universality and local choice. The assessment for the preacher's wage at Horsforth almost stalled when the parish minister, Robert Moore, who was already unpopular due to his over-thorough collection of tithes, attempted to impose a curate of his own choosing on the chapelry. A small group objected to this by withholding their contributions, and this led to others abstaining on the basis that ‘those that did subscrib to the saide booke did it but conditionlye that everyman shall paye such saide rates and sesemente as is the same are sett downe’. In the end, Stanhope had to rescue the situation by setting an example and putting forward a sum ‘to se if it would bringe others to yield to the same assessment’.Footnote ¹⁵ The implication here is that the inhabitants of Horsforth felt they could withhold their participation if their expectations were not met; all Stanhope could do was set an example and hope it would be followed. This indicates that for a new assessment, cooperation was conditional and could not be coerced, so participation was to some degree an expression of assent.

Elsewhere in the South Pennines support for preaching took on an even more collective and voluntary character. As we have seen, in 1620 plans were set in motion to rebuild and extend Sowerby chapel within Halifax parish. The necessary increase in capacity was due to the popularity of Sowerby's preaching minister, John Broadley. The centrality of hearing sermons to the project was evident in the reconfigured interior, in which the pulpit was moved to a central position to dominate the new space.Footnote ¹⁶ The fundraising at Sowerby was an exercise in communal decision-making and organisation. Twelve ‘most sufficient’ men were elected by the inhabitants of the chapelry and had the ‘power and authority of the minister, churchwardens and inhabitants’ bestowed upon them to carry out the fundraising and works. The assessment subsequently organised by the twelve men was thus an expression of the will and consensus of the people.Footnote ¹⁷ There were probably a few Sowerby residents who refused to take part. In 1619 two men were presented for non-attendance at the chapel, having preferred to drink ale at Widow Brearley's house rather than listen to Broadley's sermons. However, most inhabitants squeezed into the chapel every Sunday and were content to participate in its expansion.Footnote ¹⁸

Support for Broadley's preaching ministry was mingled with local identity and pride in Sowerby as a place where God's Church could be found on earth. Verses written by his parishioners shortly after his death celebrated the curate and his preaching.Footnote ¹⁹ The verses lament Sowerby's loss, with lines such as ‘O Sowerby thou hadst Bethell been, who did in grace abound.’ This was extended to a sense of Sowerby being under God's special protection while Broadley lived, as the anonymous author extolled:

At Ecclesall, in Sheffield parish, an even more voluntary and collective approach developed. In 1622 the inhabitants decided to restore their old chapel and install a preaching minister and they organised collections to fund this.Footnote ²⁰ Preaching was central to the project. The interior was dominated by a new pulpit, and the desirability of proximity to this was reflected in the pew rents. A quarter of the funds raised in the first year were spent on the only decorative item in the chapel: a carefully made pulpit cushion adorned with buttons and silk tassels. The cushion would be further embellished the following year, with additional stuffing and more silk tassels. Mending the roof, in contrast, was put off until the third year. The resting place of the Word took priority.

Three separate collections were instigated at Ecclesall: to refurbish the chapel, to purchase a bell and to raise funds for the preacher's wage. A list of pew rents was also drawn up. The first collection was entitled ‘the names of the severall persons who did voluntarily contribute to the reedifying of the said chappell’ and the other lists were similarly titled to emphasise their voluntary nature. While a declaration of willingness by the organisers of a collection should not be taken as proof that all who contributed felt the same way, a close examination of the lists confirms that the voluntary nature of participation was not just rhetoric. A total of 181 individuals were named across the four lists, which was probably all the adult males in the chapelry (four women, widows, were also named). Half the contributions were for only 3d. or 4d., suggesting that many poorer individuals were included. Many names appear on one list only, with those who paid the least tending to also be those who contributed just once. Moreover, in the collection for the preacher's wage, ten out of the sixty names listed were marked as not having paid. Although this implies that the organisers suggested a minimum contribution from each individual, it shows that non-payment was possible. The fact that a few individuals could not, or would not, pay their share means that the five out of six who did contribute, did so with the knowledge that refusal was possible.

A variety of motivations for voluntary participation are suggested by the lists at Ecclesall. Most prominent, again, was the promise of local choice. The collection for the minister's wage was entitled ‘a voluntarie contribuc'on given by certaine psons and granted to be paid yearly for the mainten'nce of the preachinge minister now elected or hereafter to be chosen for servinge at the said chapel’.Footnote ²¹ As had been the case at Horsforth, the inhabitants expected local choice in return for their participation in the godly endeavour, so bringing God's Word to the chapelry was linked with local identity.

A careful examination of the lists also reveals that support increased as the project developed. Almost twice as many people contributed to the collection for the bell compared to the initial collection for chapel refurbishment. The increased participation came from seventy tiny contributions, suggesting that poorer members of the chapelry were drawn into the project at this later stage as a second chance to become involved in something that had so far proved successful. A bell was a satisfyingly finite and concrete thing to purchase collectively; it could be a symbol of community and used to mark the new festival calendar.Footnote ²² It could also, however, be used for the godly purpose of calling people to sermons. Several churchwardens’ accounts across the South Pennines record payment to an individual for ‘ringing the sermon bell’ at this time.Footnote ²³

In addition to collection lists, descriptive accounts of chapel building were also written. Anonymous authors detailed the rebuilding of Rastrick chapel in Halifax parish in 1602 and the building of Attercliffe chapel in Sheffield parish in 1629.Footnote ²⁴ The accounts include the names of numerous inhabitants who voluntarily contributed to the building effort. At Rastrick, Mr Pilkington donated an oak tree and William Savile contributed an ‘ash which came downe the river’. At Attercliffe, William Pleasington provided iron to make bars for the windows, Christopher Capper gave hair for plastering the walls, and Richard Pigot beautified two pillars in the chapel ‘with his own work’. It was not necessary to be a substantial landholder to support the effort, as help with the transport of building materials was noted in both accounts. At Rastrick, John Malinson's loan of his horse and cart was mentioned, while the Attercliffe author stated that ‘they that had draughts within us, led wall stone and timber: many gave horse-loads of lime’.

Both the Rastrick and Attercliffe accounts emphasised the willing involvement of the whole community. Several ‘common work days’ to tackle the large scale, unskilled tasks, such as the pulling down of walls and moving stones, were noted at Rastrick, along with free and generous provision of food and drink for the workers. The Attercliffe account gives more detail, and here the gradual widening of enthusiasm for the project is again evident. The author described how the project began when ‘certaine of the chiefe of the inhabitantes being by God's providence mett together’ to discuss building a chapel. This group then ‘made the rest of their neighbours aquainted with the motion, and finding them willing set uppon the worke’. Funds were raised by ‘the people's free-will offering’ and the days when everyone joined together in the cooperative work of chapel building were particularly noted. The author described how

The accounts also made it clear that the restoration and building works were intended primarily to create a space for hearing sermons, as inaugural preaching events were held at the newly opened chapels. The Rastrick account noted how Dr John Favour and Robert Moore gave sermons shortly after the chapel was reopened. At Attercliffe, Thomas Toller, the elderly vicar of Sheffield, came out to inaugurate the new chapel with a sermon. Inauguration by sermon also occurred elsewhere. Favour and Moore would repeat their double act at the newly built chapel of Headingley in the parish of Leeds in 1619, and the new chapel at Ringley, in Prestwich parish in Lancashire, was opened with a multiple preaching event in 1626.Footnote ²⁶ Formal consecration by a bishop of these new chapels did not occur until several years later. The event that sealed the building as a house of God was preaching of the Word.

In addition to providing factual information about the extent of participation in chapel building and fundraising for preaching, the collection lists and descriptive accounts had a rhetorical intention, and this is revealing. As Nicholas Aldridge and Steve Hindle have argued for other administrative records, by publicly listing the names of contributors, the collection documents functioned as a sort of ‘roll call’ of belonging to the social unit – in this case, of the newly created (or newly revived) chapelry.Footnote ²⁷ The lists were inclusive of much of the local population and so the potential to belong to a community engaged in godly endeavour was extended to the many. Likewise, the descriptive accounts emphasised the widespread and willing involvement, so the chapelry was presented as a community united in godly endeavour. The circulation of these messages meant that those early modern Protestants who stood at the back of the chapel each Sunday could, if they wished, feel that they belonged to a place that had put itself on the map of where God's Church could be found on earth.

As a young woman, Phoebe Hoyle lived between the chapel at Illingworth and the parish church at Halifax, and she attended either place of worship, depending on who was preaching.Footnote ²⁸ The ability to exercise such choice was a common feature of South Pennine parishes, with their multiple chapels-of-ease. As such, it is not surprising that having gone to the effort of creating the spaces and funds for sermon hearing, local inhabitants had some expectation of choice in the appointment of their minister. This has been seen at Ecclesall, where the intention to elect a preacher was explicitly written into the fundraising documents, and at Horsforth, where the project nearly stalled when local choice was disregarded. A few years before Phoebe Hoyle began frequenting Illingworth chapel, the vicar of Halifax, Dr John Favour, had attempted to install a ‘wandering clergyman’ as the curate there. Favour was a renowned Calvinist preacher and any minister approved by him was likely to be at least an adequate preacher. Yet the vicar's plan was met with resistance by the inhabitants of Illingworth. The grandfather of Phoebe's husband, Jonathan Priestley, ‘sent to the doctor to desire him to give them leave to make a choice of one themselves’ and proceeded to remonstrate with the vicar, saying that he would ‘answer it in the day of judgement, for those souls of Illingworth that may perish eternally for want of a godly minister, and the faithful preaching of the Word amongst us’.Footnote ²⁹ In the face of this onslaught, Favour relented and allowed the people of the chapelry to choose their own minister. For Jonathan's grandfather, and probably many others, the chapelry rather than the parish took precedence when it came to a sense of belonging and religious identity.

With local choice being so important, there were various ways in which the laity could be involved in finding a preacher and persuading him to become their minister. A group of inhabitants at Ringley chapel pursued the preacher John Angier to the house where he was staying after he had delivered a guest sermon in their newly built chapel. Inspired by his passionate pulpit performance, which had reached the extreme of him collapsing, they begged him to remain as their permanent minister.Footnote ³⁰ This expectation of local, lay choice reached its fullest expression two decades later with the development of Independency. Adam Martindale described how, in 1646, an inhabitant of Gorton chapel in Manchester parish, having heard him preach elsewhere, ‘earnestly invited me to goe thither and bestow my paines there, in order to a closure if God saw good’.Footnote ³¹ Martindale subsequently took up the offered living on the condition that others at Gorton consented to his appointment. At this time, local choice became a feature at the parish level as well as the chapelry. Adam Eyre recorded how in 1647 he and other substantial inhabitants of Penistone parish attempted to remove their unsatisfactory minister and replace him with a more proficient preacher.Footnote ³² They paid Christopher Dickinson the sum of £40 to leave and discussed his potential replacement over a game of bowls in the parlour of one of their houses. The men made plans to hear a trial sermon from the newcomer, confident that the decision to appoint rested chiefly with themselves.

The laity could also be involved in accompanying and welcoming a new preaching minister. Even chapelries of little wealth, such as Padiham in Whalley parish, made sure that a corporate welcome was available. When a new curate was appointed there in 1627, individuals were paid to travel and accompany the minister back to the chapel, and the curate's eventual arrival was celebrated with three cans of ale. Likewise, Martindale recalled how the inhabitants of Gorton had been ‘wonderfull civill to me [and] gratified me for my paines liberally’ during his trial preaching visit.Footnote ³³ Finding, appointing and installing a minister were all opportunities for the broader laity to be associated with support for preaching in their locality.

Opportunities to express support for preaching did not cease once a ministry was established. Variation in the diet of sermons could be desirable for several reasons: to revive interest, to increase the opportunities for grace, or to enhance the status of the locality as a centre for preaching. Many preachers cooperated in meeting this demand, as willingness to travel was understood as a sign of a truly called minister. Henry Newcome recounted how he had been inspired to travel to take part in a preaching exercise by the example of older Lancashire ministers, John Angier and John Heywood.Footnote ³⁴

Some idea of the distances travelled by preachers can be gained from churchwardens’ accounts, which reveal a combination of local, medium and long-distance journeys. For instance, Bradfield, Barnsley and Bingley all received frequent visitors from surrounding parishes and chapels, and from ministers based elsewhere in the diocese.Footnote ³⁵ Thomas Micklethwaite visited Barnsley chapel, where he had family connections, in 1622. He was licensed to preach throughout the diocese and a curate took care of his East Yorkshire parish while he was away. Mr Hill was a frequent visitor around the eastern side of the Pennines. He preached at Wragby in 1627, Wath-upon-Dearne in 1628 and again in 1629, Bradfield in 1634, Sheffield in 1635 and finally Ecclesfield in 1638.Footnote ³⁶ He delivered just one sermon at each location and moved on.

A steady stream of itinerant preachers stopped off at parishes and chapels as part of longer journeys. Mr Barfoot was made welcome at both Ecclesfield and Bradfield in 1621 on his way back to Lancashire after conducting a preaching tour of Northamptonshire in 1618–20.Footnote ³⁷ There were also unnamed itinerants who incorporated visits as part of their travels from places far afield. Scottish ministers preached at Bury in 1618 and Wath-upon-Dearne in 1621, and Bradfield received visitors from London, Cambridge and Ireland.Footnote ³⁸ These itinerants were frequently recorded as ‘stranger preachers’, and their sermon fees were sometimes lumped together with payments to the poor. At Wragby in the 1620s, the churchwardens made the summary recording that 12s. had been spent on ‘diverse preachers and poore men with passes’.Footnote ³⁹ The status of such preachers was reflected in their low sermon fees. The wardens of Littleborough chapel in Rochdale parish thought the sermon from an ‘ancient wayfaring minister’ was worth only 1s. Footnote ⁴⁰ Such itinerants were not always welcomed by the incumbent minister; Adam Martindale considered that they could turn the ‘chappell into a cock-pit’.Footnote ⁴¹

The culture of visiting preachers could develop into exercises at which several ministers delivered sermons. The first three decades of the seventeenth century saw a multitude of exercises springing up across the South Pennines. These were quashed in the 1630s and then revived again from the late 1640s. Exercises could exist in various forms. The Halifax Exercise was a prestigious institution that met monthly over many years. Jonathan Priestley stated that it was ‘kept up and maintained by the most eminent ministers that could be got in Yorkshire and Lancashire’.Footnote ⁴² It was led by John Favour of Halifax and was held in various locations across the West Riding. Other exercises were more sporadic. Exercises began at Bradfield chapel in 1623 and activity reached a peak in 1628, when eight exercises were held over the year, with up to seven preachers attending each meeting. The last exercise at Bradfield was held in 1632, which coincided with the arrival of Richard Neile as archbishop of York. During its nine years of existence, the Bradfield Exercise never became a regular monthly event, tending to use official Holy Days for its meetings.Footnote ⁴³

Arranging for preachers to visit was understood as a godly activity. The biography of Alice Heywood illustrated her holy life by describing how, around 1630, she had brought preachers to her locality.Footnote ⁴⁴ As with chapel building and the funding of ministers’ wages, this was a godly activity that could spread beyond individual endeavour. The corporate body of the churchwardens supported preacher mobility and the primary way they did this was by providing fees and post-sermon meals. There are more than 250 surviving records of such expenses in the South Pennines for the period 1590–1660. Sermon fees were commonly in the order of 2s. to 5s. although this increased in the 1640s and ’50s, when preachers could command 10s. for a sermon. Post-sermon meal expenses were commonly around 3s. or 4s. but could range from just a few pence for the preacher's own meal, to more than a pound for a communal meal after an exercise. For a parish or chapelry receiving a heavy influx of preachers, this expenditure could form a significant proportion of the annual outgoings. Bradfield received more than a hundred visits from preachers between 1617 and 1635. In the peak year of 1628, the wardens spent £3 6s. on fees and hospitality for preachers, one sixth of their total disbursement.Footnote ⁴⁵

Providing food for preaching ministers and dining with them were understood as markers of godly behaviour. Alice Heywood was described as being ‘ravisht w[he]n any of the lords embassadours came under her roofe, an oppertunity or entertaining such, was more worth to her than great wordly gains. I have often heard her say that every bit of meat wch a good minister eat at her table she thought nourisht her’.Footnote ⁴⁶

Indeed the post-sermon meals could be substantial affairs. The typical cost at Bradfield would have provided food and drink for at least the preacher, his companions, the host minister and the churchwardens. After an exercise involving seven preachers, 7s. 10d. was spent on the meal, equating to a gathering of at least twenty people. This does not include those inhabitants of the parish and the wider ‘company’ of the visiting preacher who may have paid for their own meal.Footnote ⁴⁷ This was an activity that reached out into the broader populace. Even taking the minimal case, the frequency of post-sermon meals meant that over time a significant proportion of the men of Bradfield could associate themselves with preachers in this way. Between 1617 and 1635 sixty-four different men served as churchwardens at Bradfield and it is probable that all of them would have dined with visiting preachers at least once. Moreover, this association was not confined to local elites; only eighteen out of the sixty-four churchwardens were listed as freeholders or copyholders in a 1637 land survey.Footnote ⁴⁸ Women and younger men were not entirely excluded from the association with preachers; they may have provided the food and wine or delivered messages to preachers to arrange a visit.Footnote ⁴⁹

Inevitably, support for preaching did not extend to all inhabitants of Bradfield. There were those such as Alicia Cottrell, who in 1623 was presented for ‘giving scurrilous speeches to the minister in the church’. There were also those who absented themselves from worship and who preferred the alehouse; Henry Page was accused of being ‘a common brewster’ and ‘keeping in his house on the Sabbath day along with diverse others’.Footnote ⁵⁰ The Bradfield churchwardens also regularly presented between six and nine recusants to the bishop's visitations between 1623 and 1637. Recusant families, such as the Revels, would not have given either active or passive support to the procuring of sermons that frequently criticised all kinds of ‘popery’. Despite these exceptions, a general support for preaching is indicated by the high levels of attendance in the chapel. By the time Bradfield had been hosting visiting preachers and exercises for several years, a new loft was required to accommodate all those who wished to hear sermons. At the same time, the pulpit was embellished with a canopy and door.Footnote ⁵¹

Support for visiting preachers and exercises was motivated by several factors. Patrick Collinson pointed out that exercises could have an economic benefit, but in the small communities of the South Pennines, the potential for the locality to be associated with godliness stands out as a prime motivation.Footnote ⁵² The churchwardens at Bradfield used the possessive ‘our’ to refer to the exercise, as did the parishioners at Sowerby.Footnote ⁵³ Local pride was not contradictory to the pious desire to hear a more varied diet of sermons. The Lancashire gentleman, Nicolas Assheton, would not fit the typical description of a godly man; he enjoyed fairs, races and general revelry. Yet he noted which verses the minister dealt with in his sermon every Sunday at his chapel of Downham and regularly returned to hear visiting preachers in the afternoon. He supported the fledgling exercise at the chapel, recording in July 1617 his disappointment that, ‘whereas there was an exercise granted to be at Downham by the bishop, it was upon contrary letters stayed’. He noted a second attempt, a month later, at which two out of the three promised preachers attended, and a third exercise on 25 November (St Katherine's Day). He was still interested enough to discuss the exercise with the vicar as they travelled to Blackburn together in May 1618.Footnote ⁵⁴ As his life was a mixture of pious and worldly pursuits, so were his motivations for supporting the exercise at Downham.

The personal qualities and skills of individual clergy were another important factor in engendering willing support for the preaching ministry. Local people wanted to have some choice in who occupied their pulpit, and this implies that not all godly clergy were the same.Footnote ⁵⁵ Hugh Ramsden, the minister at Methley, extolled that ‘to preach Christ is to preach him with savory language, not deadly and idly, but with such sweet and savory language as that the hearts of the hearers may be affected with it’.Footnote ⁵⁶ Exactly what ‘sweet and savory language’ should mean in practice, and how best to affect the hearts of hearers, were pertinent issues among the preaching ministry. Archbishop Toby Matthew attempted to impose a minimum educational standard on the men whom he ordained. However, he could not ordain every active minister in his province and his light touch enforcement of the 1604 Canons permitted a substantial amount of unregulated and unlicensed preaching in the early seventeenth century.Footnote ⁵⁷ The peer-led Halifax Exercise attempted to set standards and defend the reputation and value of the preaching ministry. The sermons given at the exercise might not have been as dryly didactic as the impression left by Elkanah Wales's notes, but the ‘plain’ method of dividing a verse to derive doctrines and uses was evidently the accepted form, heavily supported by biblical references.Footnote ⁵⁸ The discourse was deeply grounded in Scripture, learning and the moral law. In one of the first sermons recorded by Wales, Mr Saxton asked the question ‘how a man might know he is in the way to heaven or hell’ and then provided the answer that the ‘counsells of our own hearts’ should be rejected in favour of instruction and the commandments, which were the only sure ‘way to heaven’.Footnote ⁵⁹

The style and method set at the exercise contrasted with some of the preaching happening in the chapelries. The most well-known example of radical preaching is Roger Brearley, the curate of Grindleton in Lancashire. Parishioners abandoned their own parishes to hear his charismatic and mystical preaching of man's perfectibility and reunion with God. In 1616 ministers from surrounding parishes took action against Brearley and he ended up in the court of High Commission, answering charges of heterodoxy. David Como has convincingly argued that, following his trial, Brearley was reincorporated into the wider body of preaching clergy by being invited to give a sermon before his peers at the Halifax Exercise.Footnote ⁶⁰

In the same year that Brearley was drawing the crowds to Grindleton, people were also flocking to a chapel much closer to Halifax. John Crosse was the first curate at the newly built chapel at Scammonden, in the hills south-west of the town.Footnote ⁶¹ The court action brought by neighbouring ministers questioned whether Crosse was ordained and highlighted that until recently he had been a grocer's apprentice. They accused Crosse of heterodoxy and making ‘certaine extemporary and confused praires of his owne invention and fancy’. Like Brearley, Crosse had a charismatic and extempore preaching style, holding that all prayer except that ‘where unto the Spirit at that time moveth’ was damnable. His opponents claimed that some of those who flocked to hear him were ‘driven to madness and forsaike theire ordinary trades and callinge to follow him whether he list to goe’. One woman was reputably ‘sore troubled and distracted in her senses’ for several months after hearing Crosse preach.Footnote ⁶²

The response of the Halifax Exercise to the reputational threat posed by the non-graduates Brearley and Crosse was acute. The exercise was working its way through St Paul's First Letter to Timothy, which dealt with what it meant to be a minister, and this was used to criticise unlearned, disreputable clergy. The theme was begun by Theophilus Sharrock, curate of Ripponden, who had given evidence against Crosse at his trial.Footnote ⁶³ He pronounced against preachers who ‘pretend they have the spirit’ but ‘speak of errors and the doctrine of divells and inventions of the mind’. Favour proceeded to condemn lay ministers and this theme was taken up by Robert Booth, who pronounced that ‘none [are] to be admitted into church offices before they be examined and found fitt for the same’. In a subsequent sermon Anthony Nutter opined that extempore preaching ‘woud bring down the credit of ye word and preachers’. His invective was particularly aimed at those who pretended education, as it was ‘no small matter to be a preacher, [it is] not [for] everyone that speake a little latin’ and he warned of the dangers of the laity taking heed of uneducated preachers.Footnote ⁶⁴ The Halifax Exercise thus positioned itself as a guardian of the respectable, learned preaching ministry.

The conservative Halifax Exercise and the radical Brearley and Crosse represented opposite poles in the range of godly preaching happening in the late Reformation South Pennines, but there were points of contact between them. Some respectable, graduate clergy were not out of sympathy with a more radical approach.Footnote ⁶⁵ One such minister was John Broadley. The necessity of extending Sowerby chapel was testament to his ability to ‘turn full many to the lord’ with his preaching.Footnote ⁶⁶ He was a respected minister, deeply embedded in the structures of the Church, a Master of Arts and a canon of York. John Favour's niece left him a bequest in her will, and after his death a plaque commemorating his ministry would be placed in Halifax parish church.Footnote ⁶⁷ Yet there are suggestions that Broadley was in sympathy with both Brearley and Crosse. During Brearley's trial for heterodoxy, Broadley was summoned by letters of compulsion to give evidence, along with another minister who was a known supporter of Brearley.Footnote ⁶⁸ Broadley was also notably absent in the action against Crosse, despite the proximity of Sowerby chapelry to Scammonden and family connections with the latter.

No copies of Broadley's sermons survive, but other sources provide insight into his ministry. The verses written about him show that his appeal came from combining the learned, scriptural approach of the Halifax Exercise with the passion, charisma and emphasis on the Spirit displayed by Brearley and Crosse.Footnote ⁶⁹ The following sample verses shows how his parishioners celebrated his learning and ‘grounded knowledge’:

Other parts of the verses reveal how he emphasised the Spirit and injected some of Brearley's mysticism concerning union with the divine:

So Broadley preached ‘in plainness and power both’ and this was understood by his hearers as ‘the spirits evidence that such are sent of god’. Broadley's ability to successfully combine these different aspects of preaching was assisted by his early mentoring by Richard Greenham, with whom he had spent six years as a schoolmaster at Dry Drayton. Greenham reputedly took ‘such extraordinary pains with his preaching that his shirt would usually be as wet with sweating as if it had been drenched in water’ and the verses indicate that Broadley adopted a similarly passionate style.Footnote ⁷⁰ Broadley noted and wrote down the older man's advice and kept a copy of this for many years after embarking on his own ministry.Footnote ⁷¹ Significantly, these Counsels indicate Greenham's approval of extempore prayer, as he advised ‘we must speake when God giveth us occasion being thankfull for the good motions of Gods spirit’.Footnote ⁷² This influence was part of the background to Broadley's sympathy with Brearley and Crosse.

The verses written about Broadley also reveal how he handled the difficult doctrine of predestination so that it did not impede his pastoral ministry. The verses describe him as one who ‘sought to know his sheep’, ‘did neglect no pains nor means to do his people good’ and ‘a comfort to the comfortless’, suggesting that Broadley followed the example of his mentor, Greenham, in offering individual counsel. Broadley's preaching also concentrated on the practical applications of doctrines and made sure that these were pertinent to his hearers, as ‘the word of god he did apply unto each state and person’. He put his earlier experience as a schoolmaster at Dry Drayton to good use in holding a weekly class which ‘seasoned our young and tender youth’.Footnote ⁷³

Broadley's combination of knowledge and learning with charisma and emphasis on the Holy Spirit, plus his efforts at counselling, education and the careful application of doctrine specific to his hearers’ needs, led to Sowerby chapel being full each Sunday. The chapel even became a destination for sermon gadders as his flock remembered with satisfaction how ‘our fountain full did overflow to others in their need’.Footnote ⁷⁴ The ultimate accolade to the success of Broadley's ministry was the folk legend which portrayed his exposition of the Word of God as such an occasion of grace that even the weather was cooperative.Footnote ⁷⁵

The South Pennines of Yorkshire and Lancashire were undergoing rapid changes in the early seventeenth century and pious initiatives required positive choices and new actions to be made. These initiatives left records, which, although they are far from transparent renderings of religious attitudes, come close to offering a view from the pews occupied by those who did not usually have the opportunities to leave a personal account. The records show that a broad swathe of the populace in late Reformation Yorkshire and Lancashire were willing to be involved with support for preaching. The existence of this support is significant for understanding the complex and reflexive relationship between the binary construct of godliness in contemporary literature and the experience of godliness in everyday social existence. It questions the idea of ‘the godly’ as a small, well-defined and stable group that, typically as one side in a conflict with their less strenuously religious neighbours, can be easily identified in any local setting. It is true that some early modern individuals were preoccupied with claiming virtue all to themselves, as was conducive with the Reformed doctrine of salvation. However, their views should not be accepted as a neutral commentary on the religious attitudes of their less outspoken neighbours. Nor does this static model explain how an early modern individual began to become godly, or if godliness was a persistent state in all circumstances.

The collective support for godly preaching revealed in this article presents an alternative view on how godliness manifested itself within the social realities of everyday life. The records capture incipient godly identity in the dynamic process of being made, as a direction of travel rather than a fixed attribute. At this stage, godliness could be inclusive and closely linked with local identity. In fact, support for preaching can be seen as one of the new ways by which the post-Reformation new or revived chapelries drew their boundaries. To be on the inside of that boundary included an individual in godly activity and led to associations with those who were already indisputably godly. Accepting the precept that piety did not exist in isolation from everyday life, a sincere embrace of Reformed religion could be interdependent with local pride, a sense of social belonging and eagerness to hear skilful preachers. Far from inevitably causing a cleavage in local society, the interaction and organisation necessary to make preaching happen could foster a sense of community through common purpose. There was not a cliff edge distinction between ‘the godly’ and everyone else, but a hillside affording multiple levels of partial and occasional godliness. Support for godly preaching offered a foothold for the climb.