Page:The Dioceses of England.djvu/13

7 was made by adding another piece of Yorkshire to that part of Cheshire which lay between Mersey and Kibble. Till Henry VIII.'s time these civil changes did not affect the dioceses. Cumberland and Westmorland were divided between Carlisle and York; Lancashire was divided between York and the dioceses variously called Lichfield, Chester, and Coventry, that which at one time had its bishopstool in St. John's Church at Chester. Henry VIII. founded a new bishopric at Chester, with its bishopstool at St. Werburgh's. He gave it as diocese part of old Chester (alias Lichfield, alias Coventry)— namely, Cheshire and that part of Lancashire which had been taken out of Cheshire, also part of York — namely, the districts which had been taken off from Yorkshire to found the three new shires. That is to say, Henry VIII.'s diocese of Chester took in Cheshire, Lancashire, and those parts of Cumberland and Westmorland which had formed no part of the earldom of Carlisle. The lands of the earldom still formed the diocese of Carlisle.

All this is very complicated. I believe the above is a satisfactory general account, though I cannot, without research, for which I have just now no opportunity, guarantee the exact changes of every parish. There are everywhere local exceptional cases which no one can bear in mind off the spot. But I am sure that the above account satisfies the main facts of geography. One point to be noticed in these changes is that they involved a change in the provincial boundary. Henry first put his new diocese of Chester into Canterbury, then into York. That is to say, so much of the new diocese as lay south of Ribble was in the end transferred from Canterbury to York.

Later changes have enlarged the diocese of Carlisle by the rest of Cumberland and Westmorland and the northern part of Lancashire. This division, it may be noticed, though it does not answer to any civil division, answers very well to a natural division. The Bishop of Carlisle is Bishop of the lakes and mountains. The rest of Lancashire is divided between the new dioceses of Manchester and Liverpool; Cheshire makes an excellent diocese by itself.

The changes of Henry VIII. left to the diocese of York the later county of York and the county of Nottingham. Our first cry is that the three ridings and the shire should each make a