The Province of York had also its convocation: but, till the eighteenth century was far advanced, the Province of York was generally so poor, so rude, and so thinly peopled, that, in political importance, it could hardly be considered as more than a tenth part of the kingdom.

The sense of the Southern clergy was therefore popularly considered as the sense of the whole profession.

When the formal concurrence of the Northern clergy was required, it seems to have been given as a matter of course.

Indeed the canons passed by the Convocation of Canterbury in 1604 were ratified by James the First, and were ordered to be strictly observed in every part of the kingdom, two years before the Convocation of York went through the form of approving them.

Since these ecclesiastical councils became mere names, a great change has taken place in the relative position of the two Archbishoprics.