The Clergy thus stripped of all the evidences wherein they confided, and had been ever safe before, were forced to have recourse to other methods for opposing such pretences of a modus. Now by Law a Modus must have been from time immemorial, and this was judged to be the time of Richard I. higher than whose reign none of our Records relating to this subject go; and indeed none are ancienter except the Piperolls and Domesday book. When therefore a Modus of sixpence an acre for land now set at twenty shillings an acre and the Crop whereof is probably worth considerably more was pretended, they thought it a sufficient refutation of such Modus, to shew by records of the Tax rolls in the resigns of the Successors of that King, and by Inquisitions taken in virtue of commissions from the Crown, that the very land in question was set in later reigns than Richards but at three pence an acre, and therefore six pence an acre could never be then paid for the tythe thereof. This proof was indeed allowed till Baron Pryse was removed from the Exchequer Court; since which it has been rejected and all the maxims formerly received there in favour of tythes laid aside; so that the decision of the cause is now left to the testimony of living witnesses for the time of their particular memory; in which respect the Clergy lye under a manifest disadvantage, few caring to depose on their side, and their predecessors papers and accompt books seldom falling into the hands of the successors, whilst all the receipts of those predecessors are in the hands of their adversaries with whom they are at law. To bring them out of these difficulties and to put a stop to the growing evil of new Moduses starting up daily nothing seems more proper or can be more effectual than a Commission to be granted to worth virtuous and understanding Gentlemen in every County of the Kingdom to enquiry into the value of Livings and to draw up a particular account of the rights and dues of each to be returned into the Court of the Exchequer and there kept on record. This would stop at once all future pretences to new Moduses; because there is no averring against a record, and the rights of the Clergy will be fixed for ever, liable to no invasion, especially if exemplifications of such returns of the Commissioners under the Seale of the Court of Exchequer were lodged in the registry of every Bp. and Archdeacon in England.