Selected quad for the lemma: country_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
country_n	city_n	great_a	village_n	1,731	5	9.2720	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A91565	The great case of tythes truly stated, clearly opened, and fully resolved. By a countrey-man, A.P.	Pearson, Anthony, 1628-1670?	1657 (1657)	Wing P989; Thomason E931_2; ESTC R207656	39,708	44

willing to enlarge the Publique Treasury if it be sound wanting But it 's hoped our State rather looks at the freedom of the people then the encrease of the Revenue seeing so lately they took away the profits of the Court of Wards which was a much better and greater income and granted many great men such freedom for nothing as they could neither in right claim nor in reason expect without a very great sum their Estates being given to them to hold by such services and surely they will not deny the poorer sort of people their own and deer-bought encrease Secondly To Impropriators and such as have more lately bought Tythe-Rents And to these I say Though it be a general Rule Caveatemptor yet seeing the ignorance of former dayes but peeping out of popery did take it for granted both Buyer and Seller that the title was good and since the purchasers did pay great sums of money for them to the State which went to the bearing and defraying the publike charge of the Nation it is just that they have a moderate price for them with which I believe most if not all of them would be well pleased and content onely in the estimate of that rate they must consider that they bought no more but what the Abbey Monastery or other dissolved House had and these Houses out of their appropriate tythes were to find a sufficient Priest or Curate Canonically instituted which was to have allowance at the discretion of the Bishop of the Diocess and also a convenient portion of the tythe was to be set apart for the yeerly maintenance of the poor of the parish for ever as is provided by divers Acts of Parliament And after the dissolution and sale of tythes the like charge was and ought to be continued upon them as at large is proved in a Treatise called The poor Vicars Plea and let but such purchasers look to their original Grants they shall find that the yeerly value was but little and the rate small after which they paid for them and in regard of the charges and hazards upon them they were seldom or never esteemed more worth then ten years purchase and that rate at an indifferent yeerly value may well beaccepted for them This Answer will please the Impropriator well who hath not been without his fears to lose his tythes and get little or nothing for them and it cannot much displease others because it is equal and just that seeing he cannot have what is bought he have his money returned without losse But the great difficulty seemeth the raising of so great a sum of money and who shall pay it for first There are many who plead Our Lands are wholly tythe-free Others say We pay a Rate or small prescription-Rent or have a modus decimandi and our tythe is very small though our Lands be of good value Others say We have converted our Lands into Pastures and pay little tythe and therefore it seems not equal that we should pay as much as those whose Lands consist of Tillage whose tythes are often as much worth as the Land I answer That the raising of this sum is not to follow the Rate of tythe nor hath it any relation to tythe for if it had many would as justly scruple the payment of any thing towards it as they do the payment of tythes but the case must be thus considered At the dissolution Tythes of Abbeys Monasteries c. were taken into the hand of the State they sold them and the money raised went to the defraying and carrying on the great charge then upon the Nation as it was of late in our dayes when tythe-Rents were sold and at that day there were wars with France and Scotland and many great Exigences of State as the Statutes for the ground of the dissolution shews And in the service and use of these moneys the whole Nation and every man therein had his share and so far as those moneys went the people were spared as the Case was with us of late and so he that had Land tythe-free and he that paid onely a small rate for tythes and he that hast pastures and no tillage all these shared in the sum yea and the very Impropriator himself and not according to the proportion of tything but according to the value of their Estates in Lands or Goods by which they had been otherwise chargeable And so the Impropriator depositing so much money upon a pledge the one being required the other must be returned and by a general tax it must be raised wherein every one must bear his proportion the very Impropriator himself But then comes in he that bought the Lands of Abbeys c. which he saith The Pope had made tythe-free and that when he bought his Land he also paid for the tythe and so he must either be freed from paying to the Impropriator or must have his money returned as well as he I answer Though there are many such purchasers yet I believe to the freeing the Nation from this great and long-continued oppression they or most part of them would be content to contribute without any such demand But if any stand upon it let him shew what he paid for his tythe he shall have it which was not a penny for search the Court of Augmentations and it will be found that there was not in the value of Land the least difference made between tythe-free and that which paid tythes as there was not of late in the sale of Bishops and Dean and Chapters Lands many of which also were as much tythe-free and so if they bought Land tythe-free as cheap as if they had paid tythes they have had profit enough and may now well afford to pay with their neighbors Thirdly To Parish-Ministers And with these I desire a little to expostulate the matter first as touching the end of their work and secondly as to the way of their maintenance Their work as they pretend is to preach the Gospel and to propagate Religion Now I would ask them why they suffer not only so many Villages Countrey-Towns and Parishes but even great and populous Cities and Market-Towns and whole corners of countreys to lye destitute who never could get any other Minister then a poor Vicar or Reading Curate they will presently answer me There is no maintenance without that they cannot live If I ask them further Why there is no maintenance they will tell me It is either a City or Market-Town to which there belongs no Land and so no tythes or it is an Impropriation and payes onely a small stipend or the Lands are tythe-free or claim customs and prescriptions and onely pay small rates for tythes or otherwise the people have converted their arable Lands into pastures and their tythe is of small value and will not afford a maintenance I would yet ask them again Is not a third part of the Nation in this condition and must they never have an able