Archbishop Sharpe was requested by some of the Clergy to prevent Frankland from proceeding in his labours. He consulted Tillotson as to the best method of procedure, and received from him this reply: “His instructing young men in so public a manner in University learning is contrary to his oath to do, if he hath taken a degree in either of our Universities, and I doubt, contrary to the Bishop’s oath to grant him a licence for doing it; so that your Grace does not, in this matter, consider him at all as a Dissenter. This I only offer to your Grace as what seems to me the fairest and softest way of ridding your hands of this business.” To explain this advice, it is proper to remark, that in the Middle Ages, factions arose at Oxford and Cambridge, and hosts of students, under some favourite professors, would march off to Northampton or Stamford to set up rival schools and grant degrees. Hence an oath came to be required of the University graduates, that in no other places than in the favoured retreats on the Isis and the Cam would they ever establish a scholastic lecture. It was in harmony with Tillotson’s characteristic wariness to give such counsel, but it is hardly worthy of his reputation for gentleness and Catholicity to put the disconcerted Prelate up to the trick of masking the batteries of intolerance under the specious cover of obsolete precedents. It should be added, that Archbishop Sharpe behaved very courteously to Frankland throughout this unpleasant business;[505] and also that other Dissenting tutors in different ways were hindered by the opposition of Churchmen. [Sidenote: NONCONFORMISTS.] Two other academies sprung out of Richard Frankland’s--one at Attercliffe under the superintendence of Timothy Jollie, another at Manchester under the care of John Chorlton. In the old town of Shrewsbury, Francis Tallents established a seminary about the time of the Revolution. At Taunton, Matthew Warren educated several young gentlemen for the pastorate and for secular occupations. So did Samuel Birch at an earlier period in Shilton. Joshua Oldfield also kept a school at Coventry. John Woodhouse, of Sheriff Hales, Shropshire; George Burden, of Somersetshire; Edmund Thorpe, of Sussex; Joseph Bennet, of the same county; and Josiah Bassett, of Warwickshire, may be added to the list of Nonconformist schoolmasters at different dates, between the ejectment and the end of the century.