THE PETITION OF THE Committee of Kent CONCERNING TITHES, PRESENTED To the Honourable House of Commons. WITH The Speakers Return thereto.  
Printed in the Year 1646.   

To the Right Honourable, the Knights, Citizens, and Burgesses in Parliament assembled, The humble Petition of the Committee for the County of Kent,  
Sheweth,  
THat Your Peritioners do with all humility and thankfulness bless God for the present fruits of your unwearied labours, in the great work of Reformation: particularly, in the removeall of many and great obstacles, and hindrances thereof: And for the present pledges of your pious intentions, and care for the sending abroad of an able, pious, and painful Ministry, upon the well settlement whereof, udner God, doth rest the stability and firmness of that great and weighty work.  
The serious thoughts hereof give occasion to your Petitioners to bewail the sad condition of this County, in respect of the uncertain, floating and miserable condition of our Ministry, occasioned by the very nature, manner, and adjuncts of their subsistence by way of Tithes, which the experience of thus many ages doth plainly evince to be miserably attended with these ensuing mischiefs, viz.  
That for the nature of this subsistence, It is a very mystery and and secret, not easily without much art, and industry attained unto: Namely for the Minister to know his deuce, demandable, or the Parishioners their duties payable; whence ariseth, that multitude of scandalous and vexatious suits, and brabbles between Minister and People, which doth fill almost all the Courts at Westminster, and of late the Justice-sitting in the Country likewise with causes of this kind.  
For the manner of it, respecting either the collecting or paying thereof, it is a mutual scourge in the hand of Minister and People each to other; If either or both (as too often happens) be covetous or cross.  
For its adjuncts, the mischiefs of them will appear innumerable, if the pregnancy of only one be but considered, namely the unreasonable disproportion of Live, or values of Churches to which they are belonging, whence arise these inseparable evils;  
1. That most unworthy persons, who by favour or friendship, or any sinister ways can get into the greatest Live, being once invested with a legal right of freehold for their lives, securely fleece the flock, and feed themselves, without fear or care, more than to keep themselves without the compass of a sequestration, whilst others both painful and conscionable serve and starve.  
2. That for obtaining of those Live, we see such sordid compliances with such persons as have the fattest benefices (as they count and call them) in their dispose, such artifices in contriving, making and colouring over simoniacal and sinful bargains, compacts and matches, such chopping of Churches, and restless change of places, till they get into the easiest and warmest, and other such like practices, not to be named, nor yet to be prevented, or removed, otherwise then by plucking up the very root which naturally brancheth out itself into these foresaid mischiefs, so obstructive and destructive to all Reformation.  
All which considered, your Petitioners out of their unfeigned desires of the happy progress of this great work of Reformation, whereof without a godly and well settled Ministry we can have no hopes, do humbly submit to the consideration of this honourable House, the Propositions hereunto annexed.  
Humbly praying, that thereby or by such other ways and means as this honourable House in their wisdom shall think fit, a timely provision may be made for the peaceable and comfortable support of a pious and painful Ministry in lieu of Tithes within this County, otherwise in danger thereby to lose what hath been already wrought therein towards a Reformation, and speedily to degenerate into the murmuring temper of that mixed multitude among us, so lately driven out of Egypt against their wills; and whether their return will not be prevented without a timely provision for a settled, unentangled godly Ministry, whose subsistence and support to be such as may with all due encouragement leave them free to serve the Lord without distraction, and to give themselves to the Word of God, and Prayer; And to be only employed to make ready a people prepared for the Lord, which is the only way of facilitating to your hands what God hath and shall put into your hearts, for his glory and his Churches, and this poor Kingdoms good.  
And your Petitioners shall daily pray, etc.   

Propositions humbly presented unto the honourable House of Commons, for settling a maintenance to the Ministry in the County of Kent in lieu of Tithes, viz.  
1. THat there be a Commission of inquiry of the yearly value of every Living, propriate or impropriate, within the County, what the Tithes and Profits thereof are reasonably worth, communibus annis, arising from the Parish, excepting the Glebe Lands.  
2. That in the same inquiry, a distinct return be made of the yearly value of the Glebe Lands in every Parish, and to whom they do belong, whether impropaiate or otherwise.  
3. That according to the said estimate of the yearly value of the Tithes and Profits so returned by such inquiry, the like yearly sum in lieu thereof be annually taxed and leavyed by way of Sesse upon the particular Farms and Lands within each Parish; wherein no Land now exempt from payment of Tithes, or chargeable with any certain sum of money in lieu thereof by particular Customs, to be charged otherwise then according to the said Customs.  
4. That the said yearly fumme so taxed and leavy●● be paid halfe-yeerly into one Common Treasury within the County, to be committed into the hands of special trusties to be thereunto appointed.  
5. That out of the said Common Treasury be issued forth by halfe-yearly payments, to each Impropriator such annual sum, as upon the said inquiry and estimate, his Impropriation shall be found to amount unto; first deducting the halfe-yeerly value of his Glebe Lands according to the said estimate thereof returned upon the said inquiry; and also deducting the half-yeerly value of such annual pensions and allowances, as are paid by the said Impropriator to the Incumbent Minister in the said Impropriate Parish.  
6. That out of the residue of the said common Stock be likewise issued forth a halfe-yeerly allowance, so far as the same will extend, to each Incumbent Minister within the County by the said trusties, due regard being therein had to the deserts of the person, and his Family-charge.  
7. That what additional provisions shall be thought fit by the House to be made for the supply of incompetent Live within the County, whether out of the Revenues of Deans and Chapters, or by buying in of Impropriations, or otherwise, be likewise brought into the Common Stock and Treasury, and from thence issue forth to Incumbent Ministers, like respect being had to the difference of their persons and their conditions, as in the last p●●●●…ent clause.  
8. That 〈…〉 said Common Stock shall extend, a due provision may be thence made in case of death, of the Incumbent Mi●isters for the supply and maintenance of wife and children.   

The Return of the SPEAKER to the Committee of Kent,  
WHo, by order of the House of Commons, did give the Petitioners (the Committee of Kent) thanks for their former services, and took notice of their good affections to the public; and did acquaint them, That the great businesses of the Kingdom are now instant and pressing upon them, and that they will take the Petition into consideration in due time and that in the mean time they take car● 〈◊〉 Tithes may be paid according to L●….  
FINIS.