How long Paddington remained in this unenviable condition I cannot say; but we are told by Blackstone, that the appropriating corporations served the churches “in so scandalous a manner, and the parishes suffered so much by the neglect of appropriators, that the legislature was forced to interpose: and accordingly it is enacted by statute 15th Richard II, cap. 6, that in all appropriations of churches, the diocesan bishop, shall ordain (in proportion to the value of the church) a competent sum to be distributed among the poor parishioners, annually; and that the vicarage shall be _sufficiently_ endowed.” And this great Judge adds, “It seems the parish were frequently sufferers, not only by the want of divine service, but also by witholding those alms, for which, among other purposes, the payment of tithes was originally imposed: and therefore in this Act a pension is directed to be distributed among the poor parochians, as well as a sufficient stipend to the vicar.” And he goes on to say, “but he being liable to be removed at the pleasure of the appropriator, was not likely to insist too rigidly on the legal sufficiency of the stipend: and therefore by statute 4, Henry IV, cap. 12, it is ordained, that the vicar shall be a secular person, not a member of any religious house; that he shall be vicar perpetual, not removable at the caprice of the monastery; and that he shall be canonically instituted and inducted, and be sufficiently endowed, at the discretion of the ordinary, for these three express purposes, to do divine service, to inform the people, and to keep hospitality. The endowments in consequence of these statutes have usually been a portion of the glebe, or land, belonging to the parsonage, and a particular share of the tithes, which the appropriates found it most troublesome to collect, and which are therefore generally called privy or small tithes; the greater, or predial, tithes being still reserved to their own use.” {122a} And thus, the appropriates of those days were compelled by statute to provide, in some sort, both for the souls and bodies of those, from whom proceeded the revenues of the church. But before these statutes could be obtained, the voice of Wickliffe had been heard not only at Lutterworth, but in London and Westminster; and the degenerate Church, which this worthy rector denounced, could no longer resist some of those reforms, which the State had long seen to be necessary. {122b} We have seen by Tanner’s note that Paddington was spoken of as a parish in the time of Richard the second, and by the Valor Ecclesiasticus of Henry the eighth that the rectory, no longer an appendage to St. Margaret’s, yielded, like the manor, a separate revenue to the Abbey.