be produced Though I think this latter is an Argument of far less Authority than the former and if there had been Instances of Convocations like ours in the Apostles Days yet this would not prove their Divine Right unless there could be shew'd a Command of God for it for a great many Examples have not the force of Precepts even in Scripture it self but are of an inferiour Nature and serve for no other Purpose than to direct what may be most proper to be done in like Cases As the Order of Deaconesses and others tho' as early as the Apostles Age is now wholly laid aside The end of its Institution ceasing which was to instruct the younger Women in the Faith when there were stronger Reasons for the abolishing it Prudence is to judge how far such Examples are to be followed Now whether this Notion of a Divine Right has any Foundation in Scripture or can be grounded upon any Examples in the Primitive Church or not it is past all Controversie that our Kings have an Authority devolved on them by our Laws and acknowledg'd as of Right belonging to them over our Convocations and that the Clergy neither have or can pretend to have by our Constitution the Liberty or Power to meet after that manner without their Assent This is very evident from the Writs by which they are summoned to assemble And as they cannot meet but by the King 's Writ so neither when met can they make any Canon or Constitution without his Licence and Approbation There is indeed a Convocation always summoned whenever a Parliament is called according to the ancient Constitution And hence some have thought That they ought to claim the same Right and Liberty to enact Laws for the Good of the Church as the other for the Advantage and Welfare of the State But the Case is very different the Reasons of calling the Clergy anciently every Parliament was upon a Political Account because they were then look'd upon as a Member of the Parliament and could not be taxt but by their own Grants But that Reason is now in great measure out of Doors And though they are still summoned that they may be ready upon all Occasions to advise and counsel the King in making Provisions for the Security of Religion and the Preservation of the Church yet as there is not always the same Necessity for their sitting and acting as for the Parliaments so the King is made the sole Arbiter of it But this Particular has lately been so fully and largely discussed by a very learned Pen that there is no need of farther Addition And indeed if we may stand to the Decision of the Laws of the Land this whole Controversie will soon be at an end For it is no difficult matter to be resolved about the Power the King is invested with by being Head of the Church and what Privileges are reserved for the Clergy by their own Suffrage and Decree in Convocation and by Act of Parliament The King by his Power is to call the Convocation they are to assemble only by his Writs they are to debate upon such Matters as he shall offer and are to constitute no Orders or make any Laws without his Consent This is very apparent from the Act of Parliament where the King 's humble and obedient Subjects the Clergy of this Realm of England have not only acknowledged according to the Truth That the Convocations of the same Clergy is always hath been and ought to be assembled only by the King 's Writ but also submitting themselves to the King's Majesty have promised in Verbo Sacerdotis That they will never from henceforth presume to attempt alledge claim or put in ure enact promulge or execute any new Canons Constitutions Ordinances Provincial or other or by whatsoever other Name they shall be called in the Convocation unless the King 's most Royal Assent and Licence may to them be had to make promulge and execute the same and that His Majesty do give His most Royal Assent and Authority in that Behalf And where divers Constitutions Ordinances and Canons Provincial or Synodal which heretofore have been enacted and be thought not only to be much prejudicial to the King's Prerogative Royal and repugnant to the Laws and Statutes of this Realm but also over-much onerous to His Highness and His Subjects the said Clergy hath most humbly besought the King's Highness That the said Constitutions and Canons may be committed to the Examination and Iudgment of His Highness and of two and thirty Persons of the King's Subjects whereof sixteen to be of the upper and nether House of the Parliament of the Temporalty and other sixteen to be of the Clergy of this Realm and all the said two and thirty Persons to be chosen and appointed by the King's Majesty And that such of the said Constitutions and Canons as shall be thought and determined by the said two and thirty or the more part of them shall be approved to stand with the Laws of God and consonant to the Laws of this Realm shall stand in their full Strength and Power the King 's most Royal Assent first had and obtained to the same Be it therefore now enacted by Authority of this present Parliament according to the said Submission and Petition of the said Clergy That they ne any of them from henceforth shall presume to attempt alledge claim or put in ure any Constitutions or Ordinances Provincial or Synodal or any other Canons Nor shall enact promulge or execute any such Canons Constitutions or Ordinances Provincial by whatsoever Name or Names they may be called in their Convocations in time coming which always shall be assembled by Authority of the King 's Writ unless the same Clergy may have the King 's most Royal Assent and Licence to make promulge and execute such Canons Constitutions and Ordinances Provincial or Synodal upon pain of every one of the said Clergy doing contrary to this Act and being thereof convict to suffer Imprisonment and make Fine at the King 's Will. They are indeed left at Liberty to give what Judgment they think fit upon such Matters as are offered to them and their Determinations and Decisions about them are solely in their own Breasts But they cannot have the Force of a Law unless he will be pleased both to approve and confirm them And this is the Nature of Ecclesiastical Synods amongst us by our Constitution And as this preserves the Authority of the Sovereign so does it not infringe the Liberty of the Clergy No Ecclesiastical Canons or Constitutions can be made without them Nothing can be accounted Heresie or censured as such but what by lawful Synods has been already condemned decreed to be such with the King's Consent by our own Convocations whose Acts have been ratified and confirmed by Parliament Thus tho' the Clergy can't by their own Power meet in Convocation nor decree or enact any Ecclesiastical Laws without the Sovereign
Authority yet neither can any Ecclesiastical Canon be made or any new Heresie be declared without their Advice and Approbation Grotius is indeed of Opinion That the supream Civil Authority has a Right to make Laws without the Consent of the Clergy for the Government of the Church Because if it could not it would receive some Right of governing from the Synod and consequently could not be supream whereas the highest Power being subject to God alone has under him the sole Right of Governing Besides if the supream Power could not enforce the Observance of that without a Synod which it might with one then it should receive part of its Right and Authority to govern from thence And by Consequence some part of the Government must be lodged in the Synod Which it can neither challenge by Human or Divine Right God having no-where committed such a Power to the Church and therefore not to Synods And for these Reasons he is of Opinion That the highest Power has a Right to make Orders for the Government of the Church without a Synod And to confirm it he adds the Examples of the Hebrew Kings and some of the first Christian Emperors that have exercised their Authority about things sacred without any such Convention of the Clergy But tho' these Reasons should prove such a Right in General to belong to the supream Power yet it cannot be doubted but that the same Power may so far dispense with the Execution of it as to consent That no Laws shall be made relating to Religion without the Counsel and Approbation of the Clergy But if it may be thought reasonable to have the Advice of the Clergy in all Matters of such Importance it must be also absolutely necessary That the Civil Power which is to enforce the Observance of the Injunctions resolved on by the Spiritual should have the Right of judging of its Determinations especially where all Mens Consciences as well secular as Ecclesiastical are to be concluded by them This is most certain That it is a Duty incumbent on the Prince whether the Clergy give their Opinions or not to reform and correct Abuses in the Church and he must answer for his Neglect to God if he does not do so And if before any Declaration of the Judgment of the Clergy he has a Right to order what is necessary in sacred Affairs 't is plain That his Power is superior to theirs and that it cannot be less at the meeting of a Synod than it was before it The supream Authority continues the same whether it acts by the Counsel of others or without it And there can be no Obligation to comply with it but that of Reason and Prudence The Notion of the King's Supremacy over all Persons and in all Causes as well Ecclesiastical as Civil established by our Laws owned and asserted by our Clergy and very frequently vindicated with much Strength and Learning by the greatest Men of our Church ever since the Reformation grants all that Right and Power to the King over Convocations that we contend for This Power says the Excellent Mr. Hooker being sometime in the Bishop of Rome who by sinister Practices had drawn it into his Hands was for Iust Considerations by Publick Consent annex'd unto the King 's Royal Seat and Crown from thence the Authors of Reformation would translate it into their National Assemblies or Synods Which Synods are the only Helps which they think lawful to use against such Evils in the Church as particular Iurisdictions are not sufficient to redress In which Cause our Laws have provided That the King 's Super-eminent Authority and Power shall serve As namely when the whole Ecclesiastical State or the Principal Persons therein do need Visitation and Reformation when in any part of the Church Errors Schisms Heresies Abuses Offences Contempts Enormities are grown which Men in their several Jurisdictions either do not or cannot help Whatsoever any Spiritual Power and Authority such as Legats from the See of Rome did sometime exercise hath done or might heretofore have done for the Remedies of those Evils in lawful sort that is to say without the Violation of the Laws of God or Nature in the Deed done as much in every Degree our Laws have fully granted that the King for ever may do not only by setting Ecclesiastical Synods on work that the thing may be their Act and the King the Motioner unto it for so much perhaps the Masters of the Reformation will grant But by Commissions few or many who having the King's Letters Patents may in the Vertue thereof execute the Premises as Agents in the Right not of their own peculiar and ordinary but of his Super-eminent Power This Passage as tho' designed on Purpose against the present Opposers of the King's Supremacy is not only an Account of the Power our King has over his Convocations by the Law of the Land but also a Vindication of that Law in investing him with such Authority And I the rather thought it deserved to be taken notice of that I might oppose the Judgment of this great and learned Man to the Censures of two late Authors who have taken a great deal of Freedom in blackening the Memory of the Convocation in Henry the 8th's Reign for surrendring up to the King the Right and Liberty of meeting without his Leave The Author of the Municipium Ecclesiasticum in his Preface insults over that Convocation as under the lash of a Praemunire and from thence seeks to prejudice the Authority of the convocation-Convocation-Act But this is a great Blunder for the Praemunire was off at least three Years before and released by Act of Parliament in the 22d of Henry the 8th the Convocation-Act being not till the 25th But to let that pass this whole Eighth Book of Ecclesiastical Polity is designed for a Vindication of the Kings Power in that Particular as also of our Laws and the Consent of the Clergy by which it was confirmed Except therefore we make the King's Authority over the Clergy less in the greatest things than the Power of the meanest Governors is in all things over those which are under them how should we think it a Matter decent that the Clergy should impose Laws the supream Governors Assent not asked But lest some sort of Men should pretend that this 8th Book is not so much and truly Mr. Hooker's as those which are published by himself which however is not questioned by the last of these Authors mentioned that quotes from it how much to his purpose I shall consider hereafter I shall add a Passage out of his Preface There was says he speaking in Reference to some who had a Dislike to the Constitution of the Church then established by Law in my poor Understanding no Remedy but to set down this as my final resolute Persuasion Surely the present Form of Church-Government which the Laws of this Land have established is such as no Law
of God not of Men and the whole Work was his not the Apostles As for the use of the Keys which is perpetually annext to the Pastoral Office that implies no Iurisdiction The denouncing the Divine Threats and Punishments and the enjoyning restitution of Goods unjustly gotten are only so many declarations of the Divine Law Excommunication is of the same kind The denying the Sacraments to notorious Offenders is not Exercising any Dominion over them but is only a Suspension of the Pastors own Act and therefore is not any part of Jurisdiction From the whole it appears That the Authority which was committed to the Clergy does not reach to the making of Laws or to oblige any Persons to be subject to their Injunctions by Vertue of their own Power They may do both by the consent and permission of the Supream Authority but of themselves they can pretend no Right They are only allowed by the Scriptures to declare and deliver their Opinions about any Religious Matters but the Sovereign Power alone can confirm them and give them the force of Laws But however if at any time there may seem to be absolute necessity for a Convocation to meet for the condemning Errors and Heresies which may have crept into and have disturbed the Peace of the Church Though the Prince in such a Case will not consent to the Assembling the Clergy they may notwithstanding as many of them as think fit give their Opinions concerning such false Notions And if their Opinions have any weight in them they may be perhaps as much regarded by the judicious part of the World as the Judgment of a whole Convocation For when Men Publish their Reasons concerning any Opinions every Body is at liberty to Discuss and Examine them to search into the strength of their Arguments be able to discover whether their Thoughts are well weighed or whether they are not the effects of a peevish mis-guided Zeal rather than of a serious deliberate Judgment The World can then judge whether Mens Enquiries into others Notions and their Censures of them are impartial or not whether a Man's prejudice or perhaps his Ignorance or both do not biass or mis-lead his Apprehensions It is not impossible that Men may side with a Party in a Convocation only because 't is the greatest may judge against Men and their Opinions only because they are theirs but the World may be best satisfied of the Reasons and Motives of every Man's Judgment when they are submitted to Publick Examination Besides the Consent of a Church may be known by the unanimous Writings of all the Great Men of that Church that have treated of such Subjects For the Affairs of Religion have been more often managed this way and the Consent of the Church more frequently signified by Communication of Letters as Grotius observes than by Synods I would not be thought to derogate from the usefulness of Convocations and from that Respect and Submission which is justly due to their Decisions Whenever the King shall be pleased to give them leave to sit and Act every Man is obliged to be determined by their Orders and Decrees as soon as ever they are legally confirmed But there is not at all times a necessity for their Meeting and there may be often greater Reasons to urge against than for it Grotius assigns these as two of the chief Ends of having Synods one is to counsel and direct the Prince in the advancement of Truth and Piety the other that the Consent of the Church may be Established and made known But a Synod is not absolutely necessary upon either of these accounts Counsel is not necessary for a Prince in things that are sufficiently plain by the Light of Nature or Supernatural Revelation Who doubts but he that denies a God a Providence or a Iudgment to come that calls in question the Divinity of Christ or the Redemption purchased by him who I say can doubt that a Man so profane may not be put out of Office or banished the Common-wealth without the advice of others Besides the Prince has the Judgment of former Synods to assist and guide him in such Cases so that he need not be obliged to call a new one He hath the perpetual Consent and Determinations of the most Serious and Learned Men who have lived in all other Ages as well as the present so that a Synod cannot be absolutely necessary for this End As for the Consent of a whole Church there may be other Methods as was already observed of declaring that without the Meeting of a Convocation If then the Ends for which Convocations are to be called are not indispensably necessary certainly their Right to sit cannot be Divine But however it may be this to me seems very apparent that they are guilty of a very great Sin against God and their own Consciences if any such there are that either publickly maintain or secretly believe the Divine Right of Convocations independent on the Supream Civil Authority and yet submit to be Members of such a one as has no Power to Sit or Act but what depends solely upon the Pleasure of the State If they are convinced that the Clergy have a Divine Commission to Assemble themselves and that the Concessions made by the Clergy in Henry the Eighth's Time were unjust and sinful why don't they Act agreeably to themselves Why don't they protest against the Power of the Prince to call them refuse his Writs and disobey his Summons For the very Meeting by his Appointment is an acknowledgment of his Power and an actual Surrendring of those Rights which they pretend are only theirs by Vertue of the Divine Institution and consequently are in the very least degree for ever unalienable If then there are any as I would willingly believe there are not who plead for such a Divine Right and yet submit to be called to Convocation by a Lay-Authority they must grant at least that their Practice is very inconsistent with their Notions But this I leave to the Consideration of the Elaborately confused Author of the Municipium Ecclesiasticum But yet in asserting the King's Authority over Convocations we don't mean that he may prescribe what himself thinks good to be done in the Service of God How the Word shall be taught how the Sacraments Administred That he may by judicial Sentence decide Questions which may arise about Matters of Faith and Christian Religion that Kings may Excommunicate Finally that Kings may do whatsoever is incident unto the Office and Duty of an Ecclesiastical Judge But to give Mr. Hooker's Words we mean That the King 's Royal Power is of so large compass that no Man Commanded by him can plead himself to be without the limits and bounds of that Authority And that Kings should be in such sort Supream Commanders over all Men we hold it requisite as well for the ordering of Spiritual as Civil Affairs in as much as without universal Authority
Opinions or Innovations in Religion by a judicial Sentence against them in Convocation without the Pleasure of the State The Church will by this means be deprived of its Liberty and never be in a Capacity of deciding any Controversies which may disturb its Peace and Unity And if the Prince be Heretical as 't is not impossible and will not suffer the Meeting of a Convocation our Religion will then very probably be corrupted by Errors and Heresies and the Church unable to relieve it by being divested of the Power of summoning its Clergy by whose united Opinions and Decrees a timely stop might be put to all false Doctrines and Divisions To this I answer That the Case is the same wherever the Power shall be lodged Let us suppose in a Metropolitan Now 't is not impossible but he also may be a Heretick and will not suffer a Convocation of the Clergy For if the Authority is in him the inferior Order must be as much subject to his Will as to that of the Civil Governor and may as equally be deprived of their Liberty of Meeting by the one as the other and so it may be let the Authority be placed in any other Hands But perhaps it may be thought that the Civil Power is not a proper Judge of the Necessities of the Church when its Faith or Discipline are in danger of being corrupted or destroyed Let it be granted That there may be others more fit to judge of these things tho' it may happen that even some of the Clergy themselves may be mistaken in these Matters and may be sometimes very unfit Judges of the most proper Times for calling a Convocation Yet I hope the King is not to be precluded from all Council and Advice in such Cases If any of the Clergy had the Power they would not I presume make use of it upon their own single Opinion They would certainly ask the Advice of the most Wise and Judicious in such Matters And why the King may not have the same Priviledges and Opportunities of Enquiry I can see no Reason But it is objected That the Office of the Clergy is distinct from that of the Civil Power and they receive no Parts of it from thence and therefore cannot be under its Jurisdiction So it was also among the Jews yet their Kings had the Supream Power over their Priests The Power and Authority of the King is Spiritual though he is not invested with the Spiritual Office The King indeed seems in some Cases to be subject to the Priestly Office as he is to receive the Sacraments Absolution and the like from them So also is he subject to his Physician as to his Health he is to be governed by his Rules and Methods for preserving Life Yet this does not diminish his Authority over either His Right over them as Supream Governor still remains the same But 't is again objected That the Care of Souls is the particular and immediate Business of the Clergy And the observance of the true Religion being necessary to that end 't is undeniable that they ought to have a Power of endeavouring to preserve it by such ways as may seem most effectual and proper for it To this we may answer That the Supream Governor has the same Care incumbent upon him he is obliged to preserve and defend the true Religion to see it rightly observed and to punish those that do Evil For which Reason G. Vossius as well as Grotius is of Opinion that Princes have the Supream Authority in Sacred Matters by a Divine Right For if they are the Ministers of God for Good they must have the Supream Command in Religious Matters whereby to enforce Obedience to them And indeed if the Commission given by God to Moses and Exercised afterwards by Ioshua and the Iewish Kings and never abolished by our Saviour does give the same Right and Authority to Christian Kings now to call Ecclesiastical Assemblies as they did it can't be denied that they also Act by a Divine Commission And it is one great Business of theirs that Divine Things should be rightly ordered and the Salvation of Men procured They are the Defenders and Guardians of the Divine Law The Inspectors of the Actions of all Men and have accordingly a Power to Reward and Punish 'T is also necessary that Kings should have the chief Command in Religious Matters because Religion is of mighty Service to the Civil Government nothing more advantageous for the preserving Peace and Unity Love of our Country Justice Equity and all other Moral Duties which 't is a Princes Duty to maintain And which he has no means of effecting so well as by his Sovereign Power in all Sacred Concerns And therefore to deprive him of this Power is to forbid him the Exercising those Commands which a Vertuous King is obliged to Upon the whole then it can't be denied That by our Constitution the King has the sole Power of calling and dissolving Convocations and that they have no Authority to Act but what is derived from him And whoever takes the Oath of Supremacy grants as much That this Power is no other than what was Exercised by the Iewish Kings and afterwards by the first Christian Emperors and was never disowned and protested against by the Clergy That the Practice of the Christians before the Conversion of the Supream Authority is not concerned in the Dispute and that the Scriptures are either for us or wholly silent in the Matter Tho' I think we may fairly urge That the Examples of the Iewish Kings and the general Authority given to Princes by God do sufficiently prove even from Scripture that this Power does belong to them That the Ends of Government require That where all profess the same Religion they should all be subject to the same Common Head in Spiritual as well as Civil Affairs And that He to whom the chief Care of the Church is committed and to whom it principally belongs to preserve and defend the Orders and Constitutions of it should also have the Principality of Power in Approving and Establishing them But if the Clergy have the sole Power by a Divine Commission of making Ecclesiastical Laws it will follow That 't is the Prince's Business to maintain and see them observed whether he is willing to consent to them or not He cannot refuse to obey them himself nor to oblige others to submit to them Nay more if the Clergy have a Divine Right to meet and constitute any Orders without the leave of the Supream Power they have a Right also to Decree and Enact what Laws they may judge beneficial to the Church how opposite soever to the Constitutions of the State They may declare what Doctrines they please to be taught in the Church provided they be not repugnant to the Law of God For if their Right is Divine their Power is Absolute and Uncontroulable where Scripture has not determined the bounds and