one is fundamental and held by the two Houses on no worse a title than a fundamental Constitution which is as much as any reasonable Parliamentarian need desire to have Therefore in Answer to the Fuller not taking notice of his foolish and seditious inferences we will clear those points 1. That the two Houses of Parliament are not co ordinate with the King but subordinate to him And 2. That the power of making Laws is properly and legally in the King alone As for the first we had before a Recognition made by Act of Parliament by which the Kingdom of England is acknowledged to be an Empire governed by one supream Head and King to whom all sorts and degrees of people ought to bear next to God a natural and humble obedience 24 H. 8. c. 12. which certainly the Lords and Commons had not made to the dethroning of themselves their Heirs and Successors from this co-ordinative part of Sovereignty if any such co-ordination had been then believed Or if it be supposed to excuse the matter that King Henry VIII being a severe and terrible Prince did wrest this Recognition from them which yet will hardly serve for a good defence what shall we say to the like recognition made in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths Reign 1 Eliz. c. 1. when she was green in State and her power unsetled and so less apt to work upon her people by threats and terrors Assuredly had the Houses dream't in those broken times of that co-ordinative Sovereignty which is now pretended they might have easily regained it and made up that breach which by the violent assaults of King Henry VIII had been made upon them which was a point they never aimed at Besides if this co-ordinative Majesty might be once admitted it must needs follow that though the King hath no Superiour he hath many Equals and where there is equality there is no subjection But Bracton tells us in plain terms not only that the King hath no Superiour in his Realm except God Almighty but no Equal neither and the reason which he gives is exceeding strong Quia sic amitteret praeceptum cum par in Parem non habeat potestatem Beacton de leg Angl. l. 1. c. 8. because he could not have an Equal but with the loss of his Authority and Regal Dignity considering that one Equal hath no power to command another Now lest the Fuller should object as perhaps he may that this is spoken of the King out of times of Parliament and of the Members of the Houses seorsim taken severally as particular persons but when they are convened in Parliament then they are Sovereigns and no Subjects first he must know that by the Statute of Queen Elizabeth all of the House of Commons are to take the Oath before remembred for the defending of all preheminences and authorities united and annexed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm and for bearing faith and true allegiance to the King his Heirs and lawful Successors and that if any of them do refuse this Oath Stat. 5. Eliz. 1. he is to have no voice in Parliament 2. He cannot choose but know that even sedente Parliamento both the Lords and Commons use to address themselves to his Sacred Majesty in the way of supplication and petition and certainly it is not the course for men of equal rank to send Petitions unto one another and that in those Petitions they do stile themselves his Majesties most humble and obedient Subjects Which is not only used as the common Complement which the hypocrisie of these times hath taken up though possibly it might be no otherwise meant in some late addresses but is the very phrase in some Acts of Parliament 25 Hen. 8. c. 22. c. as in the Acts at large doth at full appear 3. They may be pleased to know how happy a thing it was for the Realm of England that this Fuller did not live in former times For had he broached this Doctrine some Ages since he would have made an end of Parliaments Princes are very jealous of the smallest points of Sovereignty and love to Reign alone without any Rivals their Souls being equally made up of Pompeys and Caesars and can as little brook an Equal as endure a Superiour And lastly I must let him know what Bodinus saith who telleth us this Legum ac edictorum probatio aut publicatio quae in Curia vel Senatu fieri solet Bedin de Rep. l. 1. c. 8. non arguit imperii majestatem in Senatu vel Curia inesse viz. That the publishing and approbation of Laws and Edicts which is made ordinarily in the Court or Parliament proves not the Majesty of the State to be in the said Court or Parliament And therefore if the power of confirmation or rejecting be of a greater trust and more high concernment than that of consulting and consenting as no doubt it is the power of consulting and consenting which the Fuller doth ascribe to the two Houses of Parliament will give them but a sorry title to Co-ordinative Sovereignty This leads me on unto the Power of making Laws which as before I said is properly and legally in the King alone tanquam in proprio Subjecto as in the true and adequate subject of that Power And for the proof thereof I shall thus proceed When the Norman Conqueror first came in as he won the Kingdom by the Sword so did he govern it by his Power His Sword was then the Scepter and his Will the Law There was no need on his part of an Act of Parliament much less of calling all the Estates together to know of them after what Form and by what Laws they would be governed It might as well be said of him as in the flourish and best times of the Roman Emperors Justin Institut l. 1. c. Quod Principi placuerit legis babet vigorem that whatsoever the King willed it did pass for Law This King and some of his Successors being then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and having a despotical power on the lives and fortunes of their Subjects which they disposed of for the benefit of their Friends and followers Normans French and Flemings as to them seemed best But as the Subjects found the Yoke to be too heavy and insupportable so they addressed themselves in their Petitions to the Kings their Sovereigns to have that Yoke made easier and the burden lighter especially in such particulars of which they were most sensible at the present time By this means they obtained first to have the Laws of Edward the Confessor contain'd for the most part in the Great Charter afterwards and by this means that is to say by pouring out their prayers and desires unto them did they obtain most of the Laws and Statutes which are now remaining of the time of King Henry the 3d and King Edward the first Many of which as they were issued at the first either in Form
themselves from the Jewish Synagogue exposed to all the disadvantages of scorn and danger both by Jews and Gentiles For as concerning this Sect we know that every where it is spoken against so said the Jews to Paul at his coming to Rome Acts 28. â—2 Tacitus in Annal lib. XV. Homines per flagitia invisi as much about the same time the same Tacitus calls them and therefore odio humani generis convicti obnoxious to the common hatred of all men as it after followeth Persecuted upon this account by the Roman Emperors reviled by the malicious Pens of Celsus Prophyry Lucian Julian and the rest of that Rabble Thus also hath it happened to the Church of England No sooner had King Harry freed her from the Bondage of Rome but the proud Pharaohs of that City pursued him presently with their fulminations endeavouring to raise up all the Princes of the Earth against him nor had she sooner purged her self of those superstitions and corruptions which had been put upon her in the time of that Bondage but many hundreds of her children were forcibly driven through the Red Sea a Sea of their own blood to the Heavenly Canaan Persecuted after this in forein parts by the Inquisition at home by the malitious pens and practices of that dangerous Enemy And as if this had not been enough for her affliction her Bowels must be torn out by those very children which she had nourished in the faith though afterwards they scorned to own her for their Mother The first thing quarrelled on both sides is the Way and manner of her Reformation which is affirmed by those of Rome to have too little of the Pope and too much of the Parliament by those of the Genevian party to have too little of the People and too much of the Prince The Genevians or Presbyterians find themselves agrieved that in the agitating of this great Business there was no such consideration had of the common People as in other places their Lay-Elders being allowed no Vote either in the Consistory or the Convocation and consequently no care taken of the Peoples Interess which in a matter which so nearly concerned their souls was as great as any applauding for this cause the riotous proceedings in some other Countreys where the People threw down Altars defaced Images and in a pious zeal no doubt demolisht Churches laying thereby the ground-work of a more thorow Reformation than was made with us The Romanists do complain as loudly that this great Work was wholly carried on by the power of Parliaments And hereupon it is affirmed by D. Harding the first that took up Arms against this Church in Queen Elizabeths time that we had a Parliament-Religion a Parliament-Faith and a Parliament-Gospel as by Scultingius and some others that we had none but Parliament-Bishops and a Parliament-Clergy Two Clamors so repugnant unto one another that if the one of them be true the other cannot chuse but be very false And thus again the Papists generally object that in that great work of the Reformation there was no care taken of the Pope neither consulted with as the Patriarch of the Western Churches or as the Apostle at the least of the English Nation the Pope thereby unworthily deprived of that Supremacy which of antient Right belong'd unto him to the subverting of the Fundamentals of the Christian Faith Primo praecipuo Romanensium fidei articulo de Pontificis primatu immutato Hist Concil Trident. lib. 1. as my Author hath it Calvin and his Disciples on the other side are as much offended with setling the Supremacy upon the King the Master grievously complaining of it in his Comment on the 7th of Amos Calvin in Amos cap. 7. his Scholars doing the like in their several Pamphlets And though it be affirmed by Bracton one of our ancient Common Lawyers if my memory fail not that Kings are therefore anointed with holy Oyl Eo quod spiritualis jurisdictionis sunt capaces because they are capable of exercising Ecclesiastical or Spiritual Jurisdiction yet Calvin will have none of that condemning those for rash and inconsiderate Persons Qui faciunt eos nimis Spirituales who ascribe to them any such Authority in Spiritual matters His Followers will take after him in this particular none more professedly and at large than Caldwood or Didoclavius as he calls himself and his Associates in the Altare Damascenum To satisfie the Clamors of these opposite parties and to appease some Scruples raised thereby in Mr. G. A. of W a modest and ingenuous Gentleman my especial friend I set my self in the first place to justifie the Church of England as to the Way and Manner of her Reformation so loudly and so falsly clamoured on so little ground And by this Tract it will be proved that nothing was done here in the Reformation but what was acted by the Clergy in their Convocations or grounded on some Act of theirs precedent to it with the Advice Counsel and Consent of the Bishops and other learned men assembled by the Kings appointment and secondly that the Parliaments did nothing in it but that sometimes upon the Post-fact it was thought fit to add some strength to the Decrees and Determinations of the Church especially in inflicting punishments on the Disobedient by the Civil Sanctions And for the proof of this I have used none but Domestick Evidences that is to say the Edicts of the King the Records of Convocation and the Acts of Parliaments themselves the best assurances that can be devised in Law to convey the Truth unto us in all these particulars In the next place I have endeavoured to give satisfaction unto all those Doubts which do relate unto the King the Pope or the Churches Protestant the riotous actings of the Common People being no good ground to build a Right on either too little or too much look'd after as it is pretended in that weighty business Whose pretensions being well examined by the Testimony of the Fathers Councils and other Ecclesiastical Antiquities I hope it will appear as clearly that there was no wrong done either to the Pope or the Forein Churches in being excluded from our Councils in so great a work and that our Kings have exercised no other power in sacred matters than what is warranted unto them by the word of God and precedented with the best examples of the most godly Kings of Judah and the most pious Kings and Emperors in the happiest times Nothing in all the Managery of the Reformation but what is justifiable by the practice of the former Ages and may be drawn into Example for the Instruction and Direction of the present Powers in all occasions of like natue The next thing faulted on both sides is the publick Liturgy condemned by those of Rome first for abolishing the Mass and then for being published and communicated in the vulgar Tongue by those of the Genevian party for having too much in it of the Roman
wakened by a Sermon preach'd at Saint Pauls Cross by Dr. Bancroft then Chaplain unto Chancellor Hatton Feb. 9. 1588. upon that passage in S. John Believe not every spirit c. 1 Joh. 4.1 After which time the Earl of Leicester their great Patron being newly dead so vigilant an eye was carried towards them and such quick execution done upon them that it was high time for them to give over their open and seditious practices Their privity to Hacket's Treasons together with learned and industrious Treatises of Dr. Bilson in defence of Episcopal Government of Dr. Bancroft in discovering their dangerous proceedings and positions his Anatomy or Survey of their pretended holy Discipline Dr. Cousens his Apology for the proceeding in Courts Ecclesiastical all publish'd in the year 1593. the execution of Penry the condemnation of Vdal and the imprisonment of Cartwright happening all together gave such a check unto their fortunes that they durst never venture on the like Disturbances in Queen Elizabeths time But as once Florus said of the Affairs of Rome and Carthage so may we also say in respect of the Bishops and these Men Semper inter eos populos aut bellum Flor. Hist Rom. lib. 4. aut belli praeparatio aut infida pax fuit They either were at open War or preparing for it or at a peace more doubtful and uncertain than the War it self And in this interval while the Brethren had nothing so much as peace in their mouths they made themselves ready for the battel and drew unto their side a party like to Davids Army resorted to by every one that was in distress and every one that was in debt 1 Sam. 22.2 and every one that was discontented or otherwise were desirous of Novelties and hoped to mend their Fortunes by the change of Government Yet had they not courage enough to discover themselves excepting some preparatory Libels about the year 1635. till the Scots having in a Tumult expelled their Bishops and falling not long after into England with a puissant Army gave them the confidence of effecting that without any hazard which with such danger they had tugged for in the former times And in that confidence the Smectymnuans came to act their part on the publick Theater addressing their Discourse against Episcopacy to the Lords and Commons amongst whom they were sure enough to find very good friends and having tired out with their numbers and continual exercise the Patience of the Humble Remonstrant they began to triumph in the Victory before they had it and thought themselves as sure of setting up their beloved Presbyteries in every corner of the Kingdom as if already they were cantoned out and confirmed by Parliament Never so much outwitted as by being ingaged in that employment in which they served the turns of others without speeding their own For though they had the hap to obtain an Ordinance for abolishing all Arch-bishops and Bishops bearing date October 9.1646 and several Ordinances thereupon for setling the Presbyterian Government as they had projected it yet these last Ordinances being but Probationers expired before their time within few months after they had passed the Houses These great contrivers of our Troubles and the Churches Ruine not having the good luck to see their Discipline establish'd in any one Church within the Kingdom The Lay-brethren had other fish to fry and having made use of these hot spirits to effect their purposes laid by all care of gratifying them with that Supremacy which they affected in the Church and presently fell to the division of the Spoil among themselves Which Prey as it had been in chase from the 37 year of K. Henry the VIII who laid his first hand on that part of the Churches Patrimony 37 Harry 8. cap 16. as appears by the Statutes of that year so was it followed more or less from that time forwards except the short parenthesis of Queen Maries reign till the first Parliament of King James who past an Act against the diminution of the possessions and Estates of Bishops repealing in the same some clauses of an unprinted Statute made in the first year of Queen Elizabeth by which their Land both Sede plena and vacante were wrested from them But this Pale being broken down by the Ordinance of Octob. 9 which before we spake of there past another on the 16th of November following for the sale of those Lands which was the Game so closely followed by their Fore-fathers in the Faction and sometimes brought unto the Bay but never could be hunted to the Fall before But I return to the Smectymnuans whom though I left triumphing before the Victory as before was said yet seeing my self engaged by Duty and Provocation which I have spoken of elsewhere I was resolved to undertake them Pref. to the Hist of Episco notwithstanding all advantages which they had against me as the times then were And I resolved to undertake them in a way less capable of Contradiction of Answers and Replies than than that of Polemical Discourses to fashion my Design into the form of an History tracing Episcopacy with all the parts and powers thereof from the first Institution of it by our Lord and Saviour to the reign of Constantine at what time it had attained to its full Establishment One only Argument which I have heard of late from the mouths of many must be answered here and that is that Episcopacy is so fitted to the Kingly or Monarchical Government that it is altogether inconsistent with any other And for this they have no other proof but because King James did use to say No Bishop no King meaning thereby that there could be no King where there was no Bishop therefore it followeth è converso that there can be no Bishop where there is no King An Argument to be answered without further trouble than by looking into the three principal Estates of Italy as they stood at and before the year 1520. that is to say the Kingdom of Naples the Aristocratie of Venice and the Democraty or popular Estate of Florence with each of which Episcopacy did so well comply that it created no disturbance unto any of them but peace and comfort to them all Some of the Scots the greatest Enemies to Episcopacy in the Christian World have now of late confest ingenuoufly enough that they have buried their antient Monarchy in the same grave with it But I could never hear from any that when the Kingdom of the Lombards was destroyed in Italy and distracted into many popular and petit Signories each independent to the other the Government of the Church by Bishops as it had been formerly was ruin'd or determin'd with it And so this Argument being Topical only calculated for the Meridian of the present Times with reference to the temper of a broken and unsetled State can neither serve for any place else nor for this in fine when our Affairs shall be reduced to a setled Government
concorditer ordinari but also to consent both in their own names and in the names of those who sent them unto all such things as by mature deliberation and consent should be there ordained Which Mandate being received by the B. of London the several Bishops cited accordingly and intimation given by those Bishops unto their Arch Deacons for summoning the Clergy to make choice of their Procurators as also the Chapters or capitular Bodies to do the like The next work is to proceed to the choice of those Procurators Which choice being made the said Chapters under their common seals and the said Clergy in a publick Writing subscribed by them do bind themselves sub Hypotheca omnium bonorum suorum under the pawn and forfeiture of al their goods moveable and immoveable I speak the very words of these publick Instruments se ratum gratum acceptum habere quicquid dicti Procuratores sui nomine vice suis fecerint c. To stand to and perform whatsoever their said Procurators in their name and stead shall do determine and consent to The like is also done in the Province of York but that the Arch-bishop thereof sends out the Summons in his own name to the Suffragan Bishops the Province being small and the Suffragans not above three in number Finally as the Convocations of the Clergy in their several Provinces were called by the Arch-bishops only the Kings Writ thereunto requiring and authorizing so by the same powers were they also dissolved again when they had done the business they were called about or did desire to be dismissed to their own affairs At which time by special Writ or Mandates to the said Arch-bishops expressing the calling and assembling of the Convocation by vertue of the former Precept it is declared That on certain urgent causes and considerations moving his Majesty thereunto he thought fit with the advice of his Privy Councel that the same should be again dissolved Et ideo vobis mandamus quod eandem praesentem Convocationem hac instanti die debito modo sine ulla dilatione dissolvatis sive dissolvi faciatis prout convenit and therefore did command them to dissolve it or cause the same to be dissolved in the accustomed manner without delay Which Writ received and not before the Convocation was dissolved accordingly and so it holds in Law and practcie to this very day I have the longer staid on these publick Forms partly because not obvious unto every eye but especially to let you see by what Authority the Clergy are to be assembled in their Convocations and what it is which makes their Canons and Conclusions binding unto all those which send them thither or intrust them there Their calling by the Kings Authority makes their meeting lawful which else were liable to exceptions and disputes in Law and possibly might render them obnoxious to some grievous penalties and so would their continuance too after the Writ was issed for their Dissolution As on the contrary their breaking or dissolving of their own accord would make them guilty of contempt and consequently subject to the Kings displeasure for being called by the Kings Writ they are to continue till dissolved by the Kings Writ also notwithstanding the dissolving of the Parliament with which sometimes it might be summoned And so it was resolved in terminis by the chief Judges of the Realm and others of his Majesties Counsel Learned May 10. anno 1640. at such time as the Convocations did continue sitting the Parliament being most unhappily dissolved on the Tuesday before subscribed by Finch Lord Keeper of the Great Seal Manchester then Lord Privy Seal Littleton chief Justice of the Common Pleas Banks Atturney General Whitfield and Heath his Majesties Sergeants Authority enough for the poor Clergy to proceed on though much condemned and maligned for obedience to it Now as they have the Kings Authority not only for their Meeting but continuance also so also have they all the power of the whole National Clergy of England to make good whatsoever they conclude upon The Arch-Bishops Deans Arch-Deacons acting in their own capacities the Procurators in the name and by the power committed to them both by he Chapters or capitular Bodies and the Diocesan Clergy of both Provinces And this they did by virtue of that power and trust alone without any ratification or confirmation from King or Parliament until the 25th year of King Henry the VIII At which time they bound themselves by a Synodical Act whereof more hereafter not to enact promulge or execute any Canons Constitutions or Ordinances Provincial in their Convocations for time coming unless the Kings Highness by his Royal Assent command them to make promulge and execute the same accordingly Before this time they acted absolutely in their Convocations of their own Authority the Kings Assent neither concurring nor required and by this sole Authority which they had in themselves they did not only make Canons declare Heresie convict and censure persons suspected of Heresie in which the subjects of all sorts whose Votes were tacitely included in the suffrages of their Pastors and spiritual Fathers were concerned alike But also to conclude the Clergy whom they represented in the point of Property imposing on them what they pleased and levying it by Canons of their own enacting And they enjoyed this power to the very day in which they tendred the submission which before we spake of For by this self-authority if I may so call it they imposed and levied that great Subsidy of 120000 l. an infinite sum as the Standard of the times then was granted unto K. Henry VIII anno 1530. to free them from the fear and danger of the Praemuniri By this the Benefit of the Chapter called Similiter in the old Provincial extended formerly to the University of Oxon only was made communicable the same year unto Cambridge also By this Crome Latimer Bilney and divers others were in the year next following impeached of Heresie By this the Will and Testament of William Tracie of Toddington was condemned as scandalous and heretical and his body taken up and burnt not many days before the passing of the Act of Submission anno 1532. But this power being thought too great or inconsistent at least with the Kings Design touching his divorce the Clergy were reduced unto such a straight by the degrees and steps which you find in the following Section as to submit their power unto that of the King and to promise in verbo sacerdotii that they would do and Enact nothig in their Convocations without his consent And to the gaining of this point he was pressed the rather in regard of a Remonstraence then presented to Him by the House of Commons in which they shewed themselves aggrieved that the Clergy of this Realm should act Authoritatively and supremely in the Convocations and they in Parliament do nothing but as it was confirmed and ratified by the Royal Assent Which notwithstanding though this
Submission brought down the Convocation to the same Level with the Houses of Parliament yet being made unto the King in his single person and not as in conjunction with his House of Parliament it neither brought the Convocation under the command of Parliaments nor rendred them obnoxious to the power thereof That which they did in former times of their self-authority in matters which concerned the Church without the Kings consent co-operating and concurring with them the same they did and might do in the times succeeding the Kings Authority and Consent being superadded without the help and midwifery of an Act of Parliament though sometimes that Authority was made Use of also for binding of the subject under Temporal and Legal penalties to yield obedience and conformity to the Churches Orders Which being the true state of the present business it makes the clamour of the Papists the more unreasonable but then withal it makes it the more easily answered Temporal punishments inflicted on the refractory and disobedient in a Temporal Court may add some strength unto the Decrees and Constitutions of the Church but hey take none from it Or if they did the Religion of the Church of Rome the whole Mass of Popery as it was received and settled here in Qu. Maries Reign would have a sorry crutch to stand upon and might as justly bear the name of a Parliament-Faith as the reformed Religion of the Church of England It is true indeed that had those Convocations which were active in that Reformation being either called or summoned by the King in Parliament or by the Houses separately or convenedly without the King Or had the Members of the same been nominated and impowered by the House alone and intermixt with a considerable number of the Lords and Commons which being by the way the Case of this New Assembly I do not see how any thing which they agree on can bind the Clergy otherwise than imposed by a strong hand and against their privileges Or finally had the conclusions or results thereof been of no effect but as reported to and confirmed in Parliament the Papists might have had some ground for so gross a calumny in calling the Religion which is now established by the name of a Parliament-Religion and a Parliament-Gospel But so it is not in the Case which is now before us the said Submission notwithstanding For being the Body being still the same privileged with the same freedom of debate and determination and which is more the Procurators of the Clergy invested with the same power and Trust which before they had There was no alteration made by the said Submission in the whole constitution and composure of it but only the addition of a greater and more excellent power Nor was there any thing done here in that Reformation but either by the Clergy in their Convocations and in their Convocations rightly called and Canonically constituted or with the councel and advice of the Heads thereof in more private conferences the Parliaments of these times contributing very little towards it but acquiescing in the Wisdom of the Sovereign Prince and in the piety and zeal of the Ghostly Fathers This is the ground-work or foundation of the following Building I now time I should proceed to the Superstructures beginning first with the Ejection of the Pope and vesting the Supremacy in the Regal Crown 2. Of the Ejection of the Pope and vesting the Supremacy in the Regal Crown AND first beginning with the Ejection of the Pope and his Authority that led the way unto the Reformation of Religion which did after follow It was first voted and decreed in the Convocation before ever it became the subject of an Act of Parliament For in the year 1530. 22 Hen. 8. the Clergy being caught in a premunire were willing to redeem their danger by a sum of money and to that end the Clergy of the Province of Canterbury bestowed upon the King the sum of 100000 l. to be paid by equal portions in the same year following but the King would not so be satisfied unless they would acknowledge him for the supream Head on earth for the Church of England which though it was hard meat and would not easily down amongst amongst them yet it passed at last For being throughly debated in a Synodical way both in the upper and lower Houses of Convocation they did in sine agree upon this expression Cujus Ecclesiae sc Anglicanae Singularem protectorem unicum Supremum Dominum quantum per Christi leges licet Supremum caput ipsius Majestatem recognoscimus To this they all consented and subscribed their Hands and afterwards incorporated it into the publik Act or Instrument which was presented to the King in the Name of his Clergy for the redeeming of their errour and the grant of their money which as it doth at large appear in the Records and Acts of the Convocation so it is touched upon in a Historical way in the Antiq. Britan. Mason de Minist Anglic. and other Authors by whom it also doth appear that what was thus concluded on by the Clergy of the Province of Canterbury was also ratified and confirmed by the Convocation of the Province of York according to the usual custom save that they did not buy their pardon at so dear a rate This was the leading Card to the Game that followed For on this ground were built the Statutes prohibiting all Appeals to Rome and for determining all Ecclesiastical suits and controversies within the Kingdoms 24 H. 8. c. 12. That for the manner of electing and consecrating of Arch-Bishops and Bishops 25 H. 8. c. 20. and the prohibiting the payment of all Impositions to the Court of Rome and for obtaining all such dispensations from the See of Canterbury which formerly were procured from the Popes of Rome 25 H. 8. c. 21. Which last is builkt expresly upon this foundation That the King is the only supream Head of the Church of England and was so recognized by the Prelates and Clergy representing the said Church in their Convocation And on the very same foundation was the Statute raised 26 H. 8. c. 1. wherein the King is declared to be the supream Head of the Church of England and to have all honour and preheminences which were annexed unto that Title as by the Act it self doth at full appear Which Act being made I speak it from the Act it self only for corroboration and confirmation of that which had been done in the Convocation did afterwards draw on the Statute for the Tenths and first fruits as the point incident to the Headship or supream Authority 26 H. 8. c. 3. The second step to the Ejection of the Pope was the submission of the Clergy to the said King Henry whom they had recognizanced for their supream Head And this was first concluded on in the Convocation before it was proposed or agitated in the Houses of Parliament and was commended only to the care of the
Parliament that is might have the force of a Law by a civil Sanction The whole debate with all the Traverses and emergent difficulties which appeared therein are specified at large in the Records of Convocation Anno 1532. But being you have not opportunity to consult those Records I shall prove it by the Act of Parliament called commonly The Act of submission of the Clergy but bearing this Title in the Abridgment of the Statutes set out by Poulton That the Clergy in their Convocations shall enact no constitutions without the Kings assent In which it is premised for granted that the Clergy of the Realm of England had not only acknowledged according to the truth that the Convocation of the same Celrgy is always hath been and ought to be assembled always by the Kings Writ but also submitting themselves to the Kings Majesty had promised in verbo Sacerdotis That they would never from henceforth presume to attempt alleadge 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 Kings most Royal Assent may to them be had to make promulge and execute the same and that his Majesty do giv his most Royal Assent and Authority in that behalf Upon which ground-work of the Clergies the Parliament shortly after built this superstructure to the same effect viz. That none of the said Clergy from henceforth should presume to attempt alleadge claim or put in ure any Constitutions or Ordinances Provincial or Synodals or any other Canons norshall enact promulge or execute any such Canons Constitutions or Ordinances Provincial by whatsoever names or names they may be called in their Convocations in time coming which always shall be assembled by the Kings Writ unless the same Clergy may have the Kings most Royal Assent and Licence to make promulge and execute such Canons Constitutions and Ordinances Provincial or Synodical upon pain of every one of the said Clergy doing the contrary to this Act and thereof convicted to suffer Imprisonment and make Fine at the Kings Will 25 H. 8. c. 19. So that the Statute in effect is no more than this An Act to bind the Clergy to perform their promise to keep them fast unto their word for the time to come that no new Canon should be made in the times succeeding in the favour of the Pope or by his Authority or to the diminution of the Kings Royal Prerogative or contrary to the Laws and Statutes of this Realm of England as many Papal Constitutions were in the former Ages Which Statute I desire you nto take notice of because it is the Rule and Measure of the Churches power in making Canons Constitutions or whatsoever else you shall please to call them in their Convocations The third and final Act conducing to the Popes Ejection was an Act of Parliament 28 H. 8 c. 10. entituled An Act extinguishing the Authority of the Bishop of Rome By which it was enacted That if any person should extol the Authority of the Bishop of Rome he should incur the penalty of a preamunire that every Officer both Ecclesiastioal and Lay should be Sworn to renounce the said Bishop and his Authority and to resist it to his power and to repute any Oath formerly taken in maintenance of the said Bishop or his Authority to be void and finally that the refusal of the said Oath should be judged High Treason But this was also usher'd in by the determination first and after by the practice of all the Clergy For in the year 1534. which was two years before the passing of this Act the King had sent this Proposition to be agitated in both Vniversities and in the greatest and most famous Monasteries of the Kingdom that is to say An aliquid authoritatis in hoc Regno Angliae Pontifici Romano de jure competat plusquam alii cuicunque Episcopo extero By whom it was determined Negatively that the Bishop of Rome had no more power of Right in the Kingdom of England than any other forreign Bishop Which being testified returned under the hands and seals respectively the Originals whereof are still remaining in the Library of Sr. Robert Cotton was a good preamble to the Bishops and the rest of the Clergy assembled in their Convocation to conclude the like And so accordingly they did and made an Instrument thereof subscribed by the hands of all the Bishops and others of the Clergy and afterwards confirmed the same by their corporal Oaths The copies of which Oaths and Instrument you shall find in Foxes Acts and Monumets Vol. 2. fol. 1203. and fol. 1210 1211. of the Edition of John Day Anno 1570. And this was semblably the ground of a following Statute 35 H. 8. c. 1. wherein another Oath was devised and ratified to be imposed upon the Subject for the more clear asserting of the Kings Supremacy and the utter exclusion fo the Popes for ever which Statutes though they were all repealed by an Act of Parliament 1 and 2 d. of Phil. and Mary c. 1. yet were they all revived in 1 Elize save that the name of supream Head was changed unto that of the supream Governour and certain clauses altered in the Oath of Supremacy Where by the way you must take notice that the Statutes which concern the Kings Supremacy are not introductory of any new Right that was not in the Crown before but only declaratory of an old as our best Lawyers tell us and the Statute of the 26 of H. 8. c. 1. doth clearly intimate So that in the Ejection of the Pope of Rome which was the firt and greatest steptowards the work of Reformation the Parliament did nothing for ought it appears but what was done before in the Convocation and did no more than fortifie the Results of Holy Church by the addition and corroboration of the Secular Power 3. Of the Translation of the Scriptures and permitting them to be read in the English Tongue THE second step towards the work of Reformation and indeed one of the most especial parts thereof was the Translation of the Bible into the English Tongue and the permitting all sorts of people to peruse the same as that which visibly did tend to the discovery of the errours and corruptions in the Church of Rome and the intolerable pride and tyranny of the Roman Prelates upon which grounds it had been formerly translated into English by the hand of Wickliff and after on the spreading of Luthers Doctrine by the pains of Tindal a stout and active man in K. Henries days but not so well befriended as the work deserved especially considering that it hapned in such a time when many Printed Pamphlets did disturb the State and some of them of Tindals making which seemed to tend unto sedition and the change of Government Which being remonstrated to the King he caused divers of his Bishops together with sundry of the Learned'st and
Articles had been concluded and condescended upon by the Prelates and Clergy of the Realm in their Convocation as appeareth in the very words of the Injunction For which see Fox his Acts and Monuments fol. 1247. I find not any thing in Parliament which relates to this either to countenance the work or to require obedience and conformity from the hand of the people And to say truth neither the King nor Clergy did account it necessary but thought their own Authority sufficient to go through with it though certainly it was more necessary at that time than in any since The power and reputation of the Clergy being under foot the King scarce setled in the Supremacy so lately recognized unto him and therefore the Authority of the Parliament of more Use than afterward in Times well ballanced and established 'T is true that in some other year of that Princes Reign we find some Use and mention of an Act of Parliament in matters which concerned Religion but it was only in such Times when the hopes of Reformation were in the Wane and the Work went retrogade For in the year 1539. being the 31. H. 8. When the Lord Comwels power began to decline and the King was in a necessity of compliance with His Neighbouring Princes there passed an Act of Parliament commonly called the Statute of the six Articles or the Whip with six strings In which it was Enacted That whosoever by word or writing should Preach Teach or publish that in the blessed Sacraments of the Altar under form of Bread and Wine there is not really the natural Body and Blood of our Saviour Jesus Christ conceived of the Virgin Mary or affirm otherwise thereof than was maintained and taught in the Church of Rome should be adjudged an Heretick and suffer death by burning and forfeit all his Lands and Goods as in case of High Treason Secondly That whosoever should Teach or Preach that the Communion of the blessed Sacrament in both kinds is necessary for the health of mans soul and ought to be maintained Thirdly Or that any man ofter the Order of Priesthood received might Marry or contract Matrimony Fourthly Or that any Woman which had vowed and professed Chastity might contract Marriage Fifthly Or that private Masses were not lawful and laudable or agreable to the Word of God Or sixthly That auricular Confession was not necessary and expedient to be used in the Church of God should suffer death and forfeit Lands and Goods as a Felon 31 H. 8. c. 14. The rigour of which terrible Statute was shortly after mitigated in the said King's Reign 32 H. 8. c. 10. and 35 H. 8. c. 5. and the whole Statute absolutely repealed by Act of Parliament 1 E. 6. c. 12. But then it is to be observed first that this Parliament of K. H. 8. did not determine any thing in those six points of Doctrine which are therein recited but only took upon them to devise a course for the suppressing of the contrary Opinions by adding by the secular Power the punishment of Death and forfeiture of Lands and Goods unto the censures of the Church which were grown weak if not unvalid and consequently by degrees became neglected ever since the said K. Henry took the Headship on Him and exercised the same by a Lay Vicar General And secondly you must observe that it appeareth evidently by the Act it self that at the same time the King had called a Synod and Convocation of all the Arch-Bishops Bishops and other Learned men of the Clergy that the Articles were first deliberately and advisedly debated argued and reasoned by the said Arch-Bishops Bishops and other Learned men of the Clergy and their opinions in the same declared and made known before the matter came in Parliament And finally That being brought into the Parliament there was not any thing declared and passed as doctrinal but by the assent of the Lords Spiritual and other Learned men of the Clergy as by the Act it self doth at large appear Finally Whatsoever may be drawn from thence can be only this That K. Hen. did make use of his Court of Parliament for the establishing and confirming of some points of Popery which seemed to be in danger of a Reformation And this compared with the Statute of the 34. and 35. prohibiting the reading of the Bible by most sorts of people doth clearly shew that the Parliaments of those times did rather hinder and retard the work of Reformation in some especial parts thereof than give any furtherance to the same But to proceed There was another point of Reformation begun in the Lord Cromwels time but not produced nor brought to perfection till after his decease and then too not without the Midwifery of an Act of Parliament For in the year 1537. the Bishops and others of the Clergy of the Convocation had composed a Book entituled The Institution of a Christian Man which being subscribed by all their hands was by them presented to the King by His most excellent judgment to be allowed of or condemned This Book containing the chief Heads of Christian Religion was forthwith Printed and exposed to publick view But some things not being clearly explicated or otherwise subject to exception he caused it to be reviewed and to that end as Supream Head on Earth of the Church of Engl. I speak the very words of the Act of Parl. 32. H. 8. c. 26. appointed the Arch-Bishops and Bishops of both Provinces and also a great number of the best learned honestest and most vertuous sort of the Doctors of Divinity men of discretion judgment and good disposition to be called together to the intent that according to the very Gospel and Law of God without any partial respect or affection to the Papistical sort or any other Sect or Sects whatsoever they should declare by writing and publish as well the principal Articles and points of our Faith and Belief with the Declaration true understanding and observation of such other expedient points as by them with his Graces advice counsel and consent shall be thought needful and expedient as also for the lawful Rights Ceremonies and observation of Gods Service within this Realm This was in the year 1540. at what time the Parliament was also sitting of which the King was pleased to make this special use That whereas the work which was in hand I use again the words of the Statute required ripe and mature deliberation and was not rashly to be defined and set forth and so not fit to be restrained to the present Session an Act was passed to this effect That all Determinations Declarations Decrees Definitions and Ordinances as according to God's Word and Christ's Gospel should at any time hereafter be set forth by the said Arch-Bishops and Bishops and Doctors in Divinity now appointed or hereafter to be appointed by his Royal Majesty or else by the whole Clergy of England in and upon the matter of Christ's Religion and the Christian Faith
in their Convocations as well by the common assent as by subscriptions of their hands 5 6. Edw. 6. chap. 12. And for the time of Q. Elizabeth it is most manifest that they had no other body of Doctrine in the first part of her Reign then only the said Articles of K. Edward's Book and that which was delivered in the Book of Homilies of the said Kings time In which the Parliament had as little to do as you have seen they had in the Book of Articles But in the Convocation of the year 1562. being the fifth of the Q. Reign the Bishops and Clergy taking into consideration the said book of Articles and altering what they thought most fitting to make it more conducible to the use of the Church and the edification of the people presented it unto the Queen who caused it to be published with this Name and Title viz. Articles whereupon it was agreed by the Arch-Bishops and Bishops of both Provinces and the whole Clergy in the Convocation holden at London Anno 1562. for the avoiding of diversity of Opinions and for the establishing of Consent touching true Religion put forth by the Queens Authority Of any thing done or pretended to be done by the power of the Parliament either in the way of Approbation or of Confirmation not one word occurs either in any of the Printed Books or the Publick Registers At last indeed in the 13th of the said Queens Reign which was 8 years full after the passing of those Articles comes out a Statute for the Redressing of disorders in the Ministers of holy Church In which it was enacted That all such as were Ordained Priests or Ministers of God's Word and Sacraments after any other form then that appointed to be used in the Church of England all such as were to be Ordained or permitted to Preach or to be instituted into any Benefice with Cure of souls should publickly subscribe to the said Articles and testifie their assent unto them Which shews if you observe it well that though the Parliament did well allow of and approve the said Book of Articles yet the said Book owes neither confirmation nor authority to the Act of Parliament So that the wonder is the greater that that most insolent scoff which is put upon us by the Church of Rome in calling our Religion by the name Parliamentaria-Religio should pass so long without controle unless perhaps it was in reference to our Forms of Worship of which I am to speak in the next place But first we must make answer unto some Objections which are made against us both from Law and Practice For Practice first it is alledged by some out of Bishop Jewel in his Answer to the Cavil of Dr. Harding to be no strange matter to see Ecclesiastical Causes debated in Parliament and that it is apparent by the Laws of King Ina King Alfred King Edward c. That our Godly Fore-fathers the Princes and Peers of this Realm never vouchsafed to treat of matters touching the Common State before all Controversies of Religion and Causes Ecclesiastical had been concluded Def. of the Apol. part 6. chap. 2. sect 1. But the answer unto this is easie For first if our Religion may be called Parliamentarian because it hath received confirmation and debate in Parliament then the Religion of our Fore-fathers even Papistry it self concerning which so many Acts of Parliament were made in K. Hen. 8. and Q. Maries time must be called Parliamentarian also And secondly it is most certain that in the Parliaments or Common-Councils call them which you will both of King Inas time and the rest of the Saxon Kings which B. Jewel speaks of not only Bishops Abbots and the higher part of the Clergy but the whole Body of the Clergy generally had their Votes and Suffrages either in person or by proxie Concerning which take this for the leading Case That in the Parliament or Common-Council in K. Ethelberts time who first of all the Saxon Kings received the Gospel the Clergy were convened in as full a manner as the Lay-Subjects of that Prince Convocati Communi Concilio tam Cleri quam Populi saith Sir H. Spelman in his Collection of the Councils Anno 605. p. 118. And for the Parliament of King Ina which leads the way in Bishop Jewel it was saith the same Sr. H. Spelman p. 630. Communi Concilium Episcoporum Procerum Comitum nec non omnium Sapientum Seniorum Populorumque totius Regni Where doubtless Sapientes and Seniores and you know what Seniores signifieth in the Ecclesiastical notion must be some body else then those which after are expressed by the name of Populi which shews the falshood and absurdity of the collection made by Mr. Pryn in the Epistle to his Book against Dr. Cousins viz. That the Parliament as it is now constituted hath an ancient genuine just and lawful Prerogative to establish true Religion in our Church and to abolish and suppress all false new and counterfeit Doctrines whatsoever Unless he means upon the post fact after the Church hath done her part in determining what was true what false what new what ancient and finally what Doctrines might be counted counterfeit and what sincere And as for Law 't is true indeed that by the Statute 1 Eliz. cap. 1. The Court of Parliament hath power to determine and judge of Heresie which at first sight seems somewhat strange but on the second view you will easily find that this relates only to new and emergent Heresies not formerly declared for such in any of the first four General Councils nor in any other General Cuncil adjudging by express words of holy Scripture as also that in such new Heresies the following words restrain this power to the Assent of the Clergy in their Convocation as being best able to instruct the Parliament what they are to do and where they are to make use of the secular sword for cutting off a desperate Heretick from the Church of CHRIST or rather from the Body of all Christian people 5. Of the Reformation of the Church of England in the Forms of Worship and the Times appointed thereunto THIS Rub removed we now proceed unto a view of such Forms of Worships as have been setled in this Church since the first dawning of the day of Reformation in which our Parliaments have indeed done somewhat though it be not much The first point which was altered in the publick Liturgies was that the Creed the Pater-noster and the Ten Commandements were ordered to be said in the English Tongue to the intent the people might be perfect in them and learn them without book as our Phrase is The next the setting forth and using of the English Letany on such days and times in which it was accustomably to be read as a part of the Service But neither of these two was done by Parliament nay to say truth the Parliament did nothing in them All which was done in either of them
there being a specification of the Holy-days in the Book it self with this direction These to be observed for Holy-days and none other in which the Feasts of the Conversion of St. Paul and the Apostle Barnabas are omitted plainly and upon which specification the Stat. 5 6. Ed. 6. cap. 3. which concerns the Holy-days seems most expresly to be built And for the Offices on those days in the Common-prayer Book you may please to know that every Holy-day consisteth of two special parts that is to say rest or cessation from bodily labour and celebration of Divine or Religious duties and that the days before remembred are so far kept holy as to have still their proper and peculiar Offices which is observed in all the Cathedrals of this Kingdom and the Chappels Royal where the Service is read every day and in most Parish Churches also as oft as either of them falls upon a Sunday though the people be not in those days injoined to rest from bodily labour no more than on the Coronation-day or the Fifth of November which yet are reckoned by the people for a kind of Holy-days Put all which hath been said together and the sum is this That the proceedings of this Church in the Reformation were not meerly Regal as it is objected by some Puritans much less that they were Parliamentarian in so great a work as the Papists falsly charge upon us the Parliaments for the most part doing little in it but that they were directed in a justifiable way the work being done Synodically by the Clergy only according to the usage of the Primitive times the King concurring with them and corroborating what they had resolved on either by his own single Act in his letters Patent Proclamations and Injunctions or by some publick Act of State as in times and by Acts of Parliament 6. Of the power of making Canons for the well ordering of the Clergy and the directing of the People in the publick Duties of Religion WE are now come to the last part of this design unto the power of making Canons in which the Parliament of England have had less to do than in either of the other which are gone before Concerning which I must desire you to remember that the Clergy who had power before to make such Canons and Constitutions in their Convocation as to them seemed meet promised the King in verbo Sacerdotij not to Enact or Execute and new Canons but by his Majesties Royal Assent and by his Authority first obtained in that behalf which is thus briefly touched upon in the Ant. Brit. in the life of William Warham Arch Bishop of Canterbury Clerus in verbe Sacerdotij sidem Regi dedit ne ullas deinceps in Synodo ferrent Ecclesiasticas leges nisi Synodus authoritate Regia congregata constitutiones in Synodis publicatae eadem authoritate ratae essent Upon which ground I doubt not but I might securely raise this proposition That whatsoever the Clergy did or might do lawfully before the act of Submission in their Convocation of their own power without the Kings Authority and consent concurring the same they can and may do still since the act of their Submission the Kings Authority and consent co-operating with them in their Councils and giving confirmation to their Constitutions as was said before Further it doth appear by the asoresaid Act 25 H. 8. c. 19. That all such Canons Constitutions Ordinances and Synodals Provincial as were made before the said Submission which be not contrary or repugnant to the Laws Statutes and Customs of this Realm nor to the damage or hurt of the Kings Prerogative Royal were to be used and executed as in former times And by the Statute 26 H. 8. c. 1. of the Kings Supremacy that according to the Recognition made in Convocation our said Soveraign Lord his Heirs and Successors Kings of this Realm shall have full power and authority from time to time to visit repress reform order correct c. all such Errours Heresies Abuses Offences Contempts and Enormities whatsoever they be .c as may be most to the pleasure of Almighty God the increase of virtue in Christs Religion and for the peace unity and tranquillity of this Realm and the confirmation of the same So that you see these several ways of ordering matters for the publick weal and governance of the Church First by such ancient Canons and Constitutions as being made in former times are still in force Secondly by such new Canons as are or shall be made in Convocation with and by the Kings consent And thirdly By the Authority of the Sovereign Prince according to the Precedents laid down in the Book of God and the best ages of the Church concerning which you must remember what was said before viz. That the Statutes which concern the Kings Supremacy are Declaratory of an old power only not Introductory of a new which said we shall the better see whether the Parliament have had any thing to do either in making Canons or prescribing Orders for the regulating of Spiritual and Ecclesiastical matters and unto whom the same doth of right belong according to the Laws of the Realm of England And first King Henry being restored to his Headship of Supremacy call it which you will did not conceive himself so absolute in it though at the first much enamoured of it as not sometimes to take his Convocation with him but at all times to be advised by his Prelates when he had any thing to do that concerned the Church for which there had been no provision made by the ancient Canons grounding most times his Edicts and Injunctions Royal upon their advice and resolution For on this ground I mean the judgement and conclusions of his Convocation did he set out the Injunctions of the year 1536. for the abolishing of superstitious Holy-days the exterminating of the Popes Authority the publishing of the Book of Articles which before we spake of num 8. by all Parsons Vicars and Curates for preaching down the use of Images Reliques Pilgrimages and superstitious Miracles for rehearsing openly in the Church in the English tongue the Creed the Pater noster and the Ten Commandments for the due and reverend ministring of the Sacraments and Sacramentals for providing English Bibles to be set in every Church for the use of the people for the regular and sober life of Clergy-men and the relief of the poor And on the other side the King proceeded sometimes only by the advice of his Prelates as in the injunctions of the year 1538. for quarterly Sermons in each Parish for admitting none to Preach but men sufficiently Licenced for keeping a Register-book of Christnings Weddings and Burials for the due paying of Tythes as had been accustomed for the abolishing of the commemoration of St. Thomas Becket for singing a Parce nobis Domine instead of Ora pro nobis and the like to these And of this sort were the Injunctions which
came out in some years succeeding for the taking away of Images and Reliques with all the Ornaments of the same and all the Monumens and writings of feigned Miracles and for restraint of offering or setting up Lights in any Churches but only to the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar in which he was directed chiefly by Arch-Bishop Cranmer as also those for eating of white meats in the time of Lent the abolishing the Fast on St. Marks day and the ridiculous but superstitious sports accustomably used on the days of St. Clement St. Katherine and St. Nicholas All which and more was done in the said Kings Reign without help of Parliament For which I shall refer you to the Acts and Mon. fol. 1385 1425 1441. The like may also be affirmed of the Injunctions published in the name of K. E. 6. An. 1547. and printed also then for the Use of the Subjects And of the several Letters missive which went forth in his Name prohibiting the bearing of Candles on Candlemas-day of Ashes in Lent and of Palms on Palm-sunday for the taking down of all the Images throughout the Kingdom for administring the Communion in both kinds dated March 13 1548. for abrogating of private Masses June 24 1549. for bringing in all Missals Graduals Processionals Legends and Ordinals about the latter end of December of the same year for taking down of Altars and setting up Tables instead thereof An. 1550. and the like to these All which particulars you have in Foxes Book of Acts and Mon. in King Edwards life which whether they were done of the Kings meer motion or by advice of his Council or by consultation with his Bishops for there is little left upon Record of the Convocations of that time more than the Articles of the year 1552 certain I am that there was nothing done nor yet pretended to be done in all these particulars by the Authority of Parliament Thus also in Q. Elizabeths time before the new Bishops were well settled and the Queen assured of the affections of her Clergy she went that way to work in the Reformation which not only her two Predecessors but all the Godly Kings and Princes in the Jewish State and many of the Christian Emperours in the Primitive times had done before her in the well ordering of the Church and People committed to their care and government by Almighty God and to that end she published her Injunctions An. 1559. A Book of Orders An. 1561. Another of Advertisements An. 1562. All tending unto Reformation unto the building up of the new Jerusalem with the advice and counsel of the Metropolitan and some other Godly Prelates who were then a-about her by whom they were agreed on and subscribed unto before they were presented to her without the least concurrence of her Court of Parliament But when the times were better settled and the first difficulties of her Reign passed over she left Church-work to the disposing of Church-men who by their place and calling were most proper for it and they being met in Convocation and thereto Authorised as the Laws required did make and publish several Books of Canons as viz. 1571. An. 1584. An. 1597. Which being confirmed by the Queen under the broad Seal of England were in force of Laws to all intents and purposes which they were first made but being confirmed without those formal words Her Heirs and Successors are not binding now but expired together with the Queen No Act of Parliament required to confirm them then nor never required ever since on the like occasion A fuller evidence whereof we cannot have than in the Canons of year 1603. being the first year of King James made by the Clergy only in the Convocation and confirmed only by the King for though the old Canons were in force which had been made before the submission of the Clergy as before I shewed you which served in all these wavering and unsettled times for the perpetual standing rule of the Churches Government yet many new emergent cases did require new rules and whilst there is a possibility of Mali mores there will be a necessity of bonae Leges Now in the confirmation of these Canons we shall find it thus That the Clergy being met in their Convocation according to the Tenour and effect of his Majesties Writ his Majesty was pleased by virtue of his Prerogative Royal and Supream Authority in causes Ecclesiastical to give and grant unto them by his Letters Patents dated April 12. and June 25. full free and lawful liberty licence power and authority to convene treat debate consider consult and agree upon such Canons Orders Ordinances and Constitutions as they should think necessary fit and convenient for the honour and service of Almighty God the good and quiet of the Church and the better government thereof from time to time c. to be kept by all persons within this Realm as far as lawfully being members of the Church it may concern them which being agreed on by the Clergy and by them presented to the King humbly requiring him to give his Royal assent unto them according to the Statute made in the 25 of K. H. 8. and by his Majesties Prerogative and Supream Authority in Ecclesiastical causes to ratifie and confirm the same his Majesty was graciously pleased to confirm and ratifie them by his Letters Patents for himself his Heirs and lawful Successors straightly commanding and requiring all his loving Subjects diligently to observe execute and keep the same in all points wherein they do or may concern all or any of them No running to the Parliament to confirm these Canons nor any question made till this present by temperate and knowing men that there wanted any Act for their confirmation which the law could give them 7. An Answer to the main Objections of either Party BUT against this all which hath been said before it will be objected That being the Bishops of the Church are fully and wholly Parliamentarian and have no more Authority and Jurisdiction nisi à Parliamentis derivatum but that which is conferred upon them by the power of Parliaments as both Sanders and Schultingius do expresly say whatsoever they shall do or conclude upon either in Convocation or in more private conferences may be called Parliamentarian also And this last calumny they build on the several Statutes 24 H. 8. c. 12. touching the manner of Electing and Consecrating Arch-Bishops and Bishops that of the 1 E. 6. c. 2. appointing how they shall be chosen and what Seals they shall use these of 3 and 4 Ed. 6. c. 12. 5. 6 E. 6. for Authorizing of the Book of Ordination But chiefly that of the 8 Eliz. c. 1. for making good all Acts since 1 Eliz. in Consecrating any Arch Bishop or bishop within this Realm To give a general answer to each several cavil you may please to know that the Bishops as they now stand in the Church of England derive their Calling together with
miseries of his own May not both Factions see by this what a condition the poor Church of England is involved in by them The sight whereof althoug it justifie them not in their several courses as being not without example in their present practices yet it may serve to let you know that as the distractions and confusions under which we suffer are not the consequents of our translating of the Scriptures and publick Liturgies into the common vulgar Tongues so it is neither new nor strange that such confusionsand distractions should befal the Church 5. That the proceedings of this Church in setting out the English Liturgy were not meerly Regal and of the power of Soveraign Princes in Ecclesiastical affairs Having thus proved that nothing hath been done amiss by the Church of England with reference to Gods Word the testimonies of godly Fathes and the usage of the primitive times in leaving off the Latine Service and celebrating all Divine Offices in the English Tongue I am to justifie it next in order to the carrying on of that weighty business whether so Regular or not as we fain would have it I see you are not scrupled at the subject-matter of the Common-prayer-book which being translated into Greek Latine French and Spanish hath found a general applause in most parts of Christendom no where so little set by as it is at home All scruples in that kind have been already fully satisfied by our learned Hooker who hath examined it per partes and justified it in each part and particular Office But for the greater honour of it take this with you also which is alledged in the Conference of Hampton Court touching the Marquess of Rhosny after Duke of Sally and Lord High Treasurer of France who coming Ambassador to King James from Henry IV. and having seen the solemn celebration of our Service at Canterbury and in his Majesties Royal Chappels did often and publickly affirm that if the Reformed Churches in France had kept the same Orders as were here in England he was assured there would have been many thousand Protestants in that Kingdom more than were at that time That which you seem to stick at only is in the way and manner of proceeding in it which though you find by perusal of the Papers which I sent first unto you not to have been so Parliamentarian as the Papists made it yet still you doubt whether it were so Regular and Canonical as it might have been And this you stumble at the rather in regard that the whole Body of the Clergy in their Convocation had no hand therein either as to decree the doing of it or to approve it being done but that it was resolved on by the King or rather by the Lord Protector in the Kings Minority with some few of the Bishops by which Bishops and as small a number of Learned Church-men being framed and fashioned it was allowed of by the King confirmed or imposed rather by an Act of Parliament Your question hereupon is this Whether the King for his acting it by a Protector doth not change the Case consulting with a lesser part of his Bishops and Clergy and having their consent therein may conclude any thing in the way of a Reformation the residue and greatest part not advised withal nor yielding their consent unto it in a formal way This seems to have some reference to the Scottish Liturgie for by your Letter I perceive that one of the chief of your Objectors is a Divine of that Nation and therefore it concerns me to be very punctual in my Answer to it And that my Answer my be built on the surer Ground it is to be considered first whether the Reformation be in corruption of manners or abuses in Government whether in matters practical or in points of Doctrine 2. If in matters practical whether such practice have the character of Antiquity Universality and Consent imprinted on it or that it be the practice of particular Churches and of some times only And 3. If in points of Doctrine whether such points have been determined of before in a General Council or in particular Councils universally received and countenanced or are to be defined de novo on emergent controversies And these Distinctions being laid I shall answer briefly First If the things to be reformed be either corruptions in manners or neglect of publick duties to Almighty God abuses either in Government or the parties governing the King may do it of himself by his sole Authority The Clergy are beholden to him if he takes any of them along with him when he goeth about it And if the times should be so bad that either the whole body of the Clergy or any though the greatest part thereof should oppose him in it he may go forwards notwithstanding punishing such as shall gainsay him in so good a work and compelling others And this I look on as a Power annexed to the Regal Diadem and so inseparably annexed that Kings could be no longer Kings if it were denied them But hereof we have spoke already in the first of this Section and shall speak more hereof in the next that follows And on the other side if the Reformation be in points of Doctrin and in such points of doctrine as have not been before defined or not defined in form and manner as before laid down The King only with a few of his Bishops and Learned Clergy though never so well studied in the point disputed can do nothing in it That belongs only to the whole Body of the Clergy in their Convocation rightly called and constituted whose Acts being ratified by the King bind not alone the rest of the Clergy in whose names they Voted but all the residue of the subjects of what sort soever who are to acquiesce in their Resolutions The constant practice of the Church and that which we have said before touching the calling and authority of the Convocation makes this clear enough But if the thing to be Reformed be a matter practical we are to look into the usage of the Primitive times And if the practice prove to have been both ancient and universally received over all the Church though intermitted for a time and by time corrupted The King consulting with so many of his Bishops and others of his most able Clergy as he thinks fit to call unto him and having their consent and direction in it may in the case of intermission revive such practice and in the case of corruption and degeneration restore it to its Primitive and original lustre whether he do it of himself of his own meer motion or that he follow the advice of his Council in it whether he be of age to inform himself or that he doth relie on those to whom he hath committed the publick Government it comes all to one So they restrain themselves to the ancient patterns The Reformation which was made under josias though in his Minority and acting by the Counsel of the
Elders as Josephus telleth us Antiqu. Jud. 1. cap. was no less pleasing unto God nor less valid in the eyes of all his Subjects than those of Jehosaphat and Hezekiah in their riper years and perhaps acting singly on the strength of their own judgments only without any advice Now that there should be Liturgies for the use of the Church that those Liturgies should be celebrated in a Language understood by the people That in those Liturgies there should be some prescribed Forms for giving the Communion in both kinds for Baptizing Infants for the reverent celebration of Marriage performing the last office to the sick and the decent burial of the Dead as also for set Feasts and appointed Festivals hath been a thing of primitive and general practice in the Christian Church And being such though intermitted or corrupted as before is said the King advising with his Bishops and other Church-men though not in a Synodical way may cause the same to be revised and revived and having fitted them to edification and increase of piety either commend them to the Church by his sole authority or else impose them on the people under certain penalties by his power in Parliament Saepe Coeleste Regnum per Terrenum proficit The Kingdom of Heaven said Reverend Isidore of Sevil doth many times receive increase from these earthly Kingdoms in nothing more than by the regulating and well ordering of Gods publick worship We saw before what David did in this particular allotting to the Priest the Courses of their Ministration appointing Hymns and Songs for the Jewish Festivals ordaining Singing-men to sing and finally prescribing Vestments for the Celebration Which what else was it but a Regulating of the Worship of God the putting it into a solemn course and order to be observed from time to time in succeeding Ages Sufficient ground for Christian Princes to proceed on in the like occasions especially when all they do is rathe the reviving of the Ancient Forms than the Introduction of a new Which as the King did here in England by his own Authority the Body of the Clergy not consulted in it so possibly there might be good reason why those who had the conduct of the Kings affairs thought it not safe to put the managing of the business to a Convocation The ignorance and superstition of the common people was at that time exceeding profitable to the Clergy who by their frequent Masses for the quick and dead raised as great advantage as Demetrius and the Silver-Smith by Dianas shrines It hapned also in a time when many of the inferiour Clergy had not much more learning than what was taught them in the Massals and other Rituals and well might fear that if the Service were once extant in the English tongue the Laity would prove in time as great Clerks as themselves So that as well in point of Reputation as in point of Profit besides the love which many of them had to their former Mumpsimus it was most probable that such an hard piece of Reformation would not easily down had it been put into the power of a Convocation especially under a Prince in Nonage and a state unsettled And yet it was not so carried without them neither but that the Bishops generally did concur to the Confirmation of the Book or the approbation of it rather when it passed in Parliament the Bishops in that time and after till the last vast and most improvident increase of the Lay-nobility making the most considerable if not the greatest part of the House of Peers and so the Book not likely to be there allowed of without their consent And I the rather am inclined unto that Opinion because I find that none but Tunstal Gardiner and Bonner were displaced from their Bishopricks for not submitting in this case to the Kings appointments which seems to me a very strong and convincing argument that none but they dissented or refused conformity Add here that though the whole body of the Clergy in their Convocation were nto consulted with at first for the Reasons formerly recited yet when they found the benefit and comfort which redounded by it to good Christian people and had by little and little weaned themselves from their private interesses they all confirmed it on the Post-fact passing an Article in the Convocation of the year 1552. with this Head or Title viz. Agendum esse in Ecclesiae linguae quae fit Populo nota which is the 25th Article in King Edwards Book Lay all that hath been said together and the result of all will be briefly this that being the setting out of the Liturgy in the English Tongue was a matter practical agreeable to the Word of God and the Primitive times that the King with so many of his Bishops and others of the Clergy as he pleased to call to Counsel in it resolved upon the doing of it that the Bishops generally confirmed it when it came before them and that the whole body of the Clergy in their Convocation the Book being then under a review did avow and justifie it The result of all I say is this that as the work it self I say was good so it was done not in a Regal but a Regular way Kings were not Kings if regulating the external parts of Gods publick worship according to the Platforms of the Primitive times should not be allowed them But yet the Kings of England had a further right as to this particular which is a power conferred upon them by the Clergy whether by way of Recognition or Concession I regard not here by which they did invest the King with a Supream Authority not only of confirming their Synodical Acts not to be put in execution without his consent but in effect to devolve on him all that power which formerly they enjoyed in their own capacity And to this we have a parallel Case in the Roman Empire in which there had been once a time when the Supream Majesty of the State was vested in the Senate and people of Rome till by the Law which they called Lex Regia they transferred all their Power on Caesar and the following Emperors Which Law being passed the Edicts of the Prince or Emperor were as strong and binding as the Senatus Consulta and the Plebiseita had been before Whence came that memorable Maxim in Justinians Institutes that is to say Quod Principi placuerit legis habet vigorem The like may be affirmed of the Church of England immediately before and in the Reign of K. Henry VIII The Clergy of this Realm had a Self-authority in all matters which concerned Religion and by their Canons and Determinations did bind all the Subjects of what rank soever till by acknowledging that King for their Supream Head and by the Act of Submission not long after following they transferred that power upon the King and on his Successors By doing whereof they did not only disable themselves upon concluding any thing in their Convocations
or putting their results into execution without his consent but put him into the actual possession of that Authority which properly belonged to the Supremacy or the Supream Head in as full manner as ever the Pope of Rome or any delegated by and under him did before enjoy it After which time whatsoever the King or his Successors did in the Reformation as it had virtually the power of the Convocations so was it as effectual and good in Law as if the Clergy in their Convocation particularly and in terminis had agreed upon it Not that the King or his Successors were hereby enabled to exercise the Keys and determine Heresies much less to preach the Word and administer the Sacraments as the Papists falsly gave it out but as the Heads of the Ecclesiastical Body of this Realm to see that all the members of that Body did perform their duties to rectifie what was found amiss amongst them to preserve peace between them on emergent differences to reform such errors and corruptions as are expresly contrary to the Word of God and finally to give strength and motions to their Councils and Determinations tending to Edification and increase of Piety And though in most of their proceedings towards Reformation the Kings advised with such Bishops as they had about them or could assemble without any great trouble or inconvenience to advise withal yet was there no necessity that all or the greater part of the Bishops should be drawn together for that purpose no more than it was anciently in the Primitive Times for the godly Emperors to call together the most part of the Bishops in the Roman Empire for the establishing of the matters which concerned the Church or for the godly Kings of Judah to call together the greatest part of the Priests and Levites before they acted any thing in the Reformation of those corruptions and abuses which were crept in amongst them Which being so and then withal considering as we ought to do that there was nothing altered here in the state of Religion till either the whole Clergy in their Convocaton or the Bishops and most eminent Church-men had resolved upon it our Religion is no more to be called a Regal than a Parliament-Gospel 6. That the Clergy lost not any of their just Rights by the Act of Submission and the power of calling and confirming Councils did anciently belong to the Christian Princes If you conceive that by ascribing to the King the Supream Authority taking him for their Supream Head and by the Act of Submission which ensued upon it the Clergy did unwittingly ensnare themselves and drew a Vassallage on these of the times succeeding inconsistent with their native Rights and contrary to the usage of the Primitive Church I hope it will be no hard matter to remove that scruple It 's true the Clergy in their Convocation can do nothing now but as their doings are confirmed by the Kings Authority and I conceive it stands with reason as well as point of State that it should be so For since the two Houses of Parliament though called by the Kings Writ can conclude nothing which may bind either King or Subject in their civil Rights until it be made good by the Royal Assent so neither is it fit nor safe that the Clergy should be able by their Constitutions and Synodical Acts to conclude both Prince and People in spiritual matters until the stamp of Royal Authority be imprinted on them The Kings concurrence in this case devesteth not the Clergy of any lawful power which they ought to have but restrains them only in the exercise of some part thereof to make it more agreeable to Monarchical Government and to accommodate it to the benefit both of Prince and People It 's true the Clergy of this Realm can neither meet in Convocation nor conclude any thing therein nor put in execution any thing which they have concluded but as they are enabled by the Kings Authority But then it is as true withal that this is neither inconsistent with their native Rights nor contrary unto the usage of the Primitive Times And first it is not inconsistent with their native Rights it being a peculiar happiness of the Church of England to be always under the protection of Christian Kings by whose encouragement and example the Gospel was received in all parts of this Kingdom And if you look into Sir Henry Spelman's Collection of the Saxon Councils I believe that you will hardly find any Ecclesiastical Canons for the Government of the Church of England which were not either originally promulgated or after approved and allowed o either by the Supream Monarch of all the Saxons or by some King or other of the several Heptarchies directing in their National or Provincial Synods And they enjoyed this Prerogative without any dispute after the Norman Conquest also till by degrees the Pope in grossed it to himself as before was shewn and then conferred it upon such as were to exercise the same under his Authority which plainly manifests that the Act of Submission so much spoke of was but a changing of their dependance from the Pope to the King from an usurped to a lawful power from one to whom they had made themselves a kind of voluntary Slaves to him who justly challenged a natural dominion over them And secondly that that submission of theirs to their natural Prince is not to be considered as a new Concession but as the Recognition only of a former power In the next place I do not find it to be contrary to the usage of the Primitive times I grant indeed that when the Church was under the command of the Heathen Emperors the Clergy did Assemble in their National and Provincial Synods of their own Authority which Councils being summoned by the Metropolitans and subscribed by the Clergy were of sufficient power to bind all good Christians who lived within the Verge of their jurisdiction They could not else Assemble upon any exigence of affairs but by such Authority But it was otherwise when the Church came under the protection of Christian Princes all Emperors and Kings from Constantine the Great till the Pope carried all before him in the darker times accompting it one of the principal flowers as indeed it was which adorned their Diadems I am not willing to beat on a common place But if you please to look into the Acts of ancient Councils you will find that all the General Councils all which deserve to be so called if any of them do deserve it to have been summoned and confirmed by the Christian Emperors that the Council of Arles was called and confirmed by the Emperor Constantine that of Sardis by Constans that of Lampsacus by Valentinian that of Aquileia by Theodosius that of Thessalonica National or Provincial all by the Emperor Gratian That when the Western Empire fell into the hands of the French the Councils of Akon Mentz Meldun Wormes and Colen received both life and
especially appointed for the same are called Holy days Rot for the matter or the nature either of the time or day c. for to all days and times are of like holiness but for the nature and condition of such holy works c. whereunto such times and days are sanctified and hallowed that is to say separated from all prophane uses and dedicated not unto any Saint or Creature but only unto God and his true worship Neither is it to be thought that there is any certain time or definitive number of days prescribed in holy Scripture but the appointment both of the time and also of the number of days is left by the authority of Gods Word unto the liberty of Christs Church to be determined and assigned orderly in every Countrey by the discretion of the Rulers and Ministers thereof as they shall judg most expedient to the true setting forth of Gods glory and edification of their people Nor is it to be thought that all this Preamble was made in reference to the Holy days or Saints days only whose being left to the authority of the Church was never questioned but in relation to the Lords day also as by the Act it self doth at full appear for so it followeth in the Act Be it therefore enacted c. That all the days hereafter mentioned shall be kept and commanded to be kept Holy days and none other that is to say all Sundays in the Year the Feasts of the Circumcision of our Lord Jesus Christ of the Epiphanie of the Purification with all the rest now kept and there named particularly and that none other day shall be kept and commanded to be kept holy day and to abstain from lawful bodily labour Nay which is more there is a further Clause in the self-same Act which plainly shews that they had no such thought of the Lords day as that it was a Sabbath or so to be observed as the Sabbath was and therefore did provide it and enact by the Authority aforesaid a bat it shall be lawful to every Husbandman Labourer Fisherman and to all and every other person or persons of what estate degree or condition be or they he upon the holy days aforesaid in Harvest or at any other times in the year when necessity shall so require to labour ride fish or work any kind of work at their free-wills and pleasure any thing in this Act unto the contrary notwithstanding This is the total of this Act which if examined well as it ought to be will yield us all those propositions or conclusions before remembred which we collected from the writings of those three particular Martyrs Nor is it to be said that it is repealed and of no Authority Repealed indeed it was in the first year of Queen Mary and stood repealed in Law though otherwise in use and practice all the long Reign of Queen Elizabeth but in the first year of King James was revived again Note here that in the self-same Parliament the Common Prayer-Book now in use being reviewed by many godly Prelates was confirmed and authorized wherein so much of the said Act as doth concern the Names and Number of the Holy days is expressed and as it were incorporate into the same Which makes it manifest that in the purpose of the Church the Sunday was no otherwise esteemed of than another Holy day This Statute as before we said was made in Anno 5. 6. of Edward the sixth And in that very Parliament as before we said the Common-Prayer-Book was confirmed which still remains in use amongst us save that there was an alteration or addition of certain Lessons to be used on every Sunday of the Year 1 Eliz. cap. 2. the form of the Letany altered and corrected and two Sentences added in the delivery of the Sacrament unto the Communicants Now in this Common Prayer-Book thus confirmed in the fifth and sixth years of King Edward the sixth Cap. 1. it pleased those that had the altering and revising of it that the Commandments which were not in the former Liturgy allowed of in the second of the said Kings Reign should now be added and accounted as a part of this the people being willed to say after the end of each Commandment Lord have mercy upon us and incline our hearts to keep this Law Which being used accordingly as well upon the hearing of the fourth Commandment as of any others hath given some men a colour to persuade themselves that certainly it was the meaning of the Church that we should keep a Sabbath still though the day be changed and that we are obliged to do it by the fourth Commandment Assuredly they who so conclude conclude against the meaning of the Book and of them that made it Against the meaning of the Book for if the Book had so intended that that Ejaculation was to be understood in a literal sence according as the words are laid down in terminis it then must be the meaning of the Book that we should pray unto the Lord to keep the Sabbath of the Jews even the seventh day precisely from the Worlds Creation and keep it in the self-same manner as the Jews once did which no man I presume will say was the meaning of it For of the changing of the day there is nothing said nor nothing intimated but the whole Law laid down in terminis as the Lord delivered it Against the meaning also of them that made it for they that made the Book and reviewed it afterwards and caused these Passages and Prayers to be added to it Cranmer Archbishop of Canterbury Ridley Bishop of London and certain others of the Prelates then and there assembled were the same men by whose advice and counsel the Act before remembred about keeping Holy days was in the self-same Parliament drawn up and perfected And is it possible we should conceive so ill of those reverend persons as that they would erect a Sabbath in the one Act and beat it down so totally in the other to tell us in the Service-Book that we are bound to keep a Sabbath and that the time and day of Gods publick Worship is either pointed out in the fourth Commandment or otherwise ordained by Divine Authority and in the self-same breath to tell us that there is neither certain time nor definite number of days prescribed in Scripture but all this left unto the liberty of the Church I say as formerly I said it is impossible we should think so ill of such Reverend persons nor do I think that any will so think hereafter when they have once considered the non sequitur of their own Conclusions As for the Prayer there used we may thus expound it according to the doctrine and the practice both of those very times viz. that their intent and meaning was to teach the people to pray unto the Lord to incline their hearts to keep that Law as far as it contained the Law of Nature and had been
say the Lord Protector and the rest of the Privy Council acting in his Name and by his Authority performed by Archbishop Cranmer and the other six before remembred assisted by Thirdby Bishop of Winchester Day Bishop of Chichester Ridley Bishop of Rochester Taylor then Dean after Bishop of Lincoln Redman then Master of Trinity Colledge in Cambridge and Hains Dean of Exeter all men of great abilities in their several stations and finally confirmed by the King the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons in Parliament Assembled 23 Edw. VI. In which Confirmatory act it is said expresly to have been done by the especial aid of the Holy Ghost which testimony I find also of it in the Acts and Monuments fol 1184. But being disliked by Calvin who would needs be meddling in all matters which concerned Religion and disliked it chiefly for no other reason as appears in one of his Epistles to the Lord Protector but because it savoured too much of the ancient Forms it was brought under a review the cause of the reviewing of it being given out to be no other than that there had risen divers doubts in the Exercise of the said Book for the fashion and manner of the Ministration though risen rather by the curiosity of the Ministers and Mistakers than of any other cause 5 6 Edw. 6. cap. 1. The review made by those who had first compiled it though Hobeach and Redman might be dead before the confirmation of it by Act of Parliament some of the New Bishops added to the former number and being reviewed was brought into the same form in which now it stands save that a clause was taken out of the Letany and a sentence added to the distribution of the blessed Sacrament in the first year of Queen Elizabeth and that some alteration was made in two or three of the Rubricks with an addition of Thanksgiving in the end of the Letany as also of a Prayer for the Queen and the Royal Issue in the first of King James At the same time and by the same hands which gave us the first Liturgy of King Edward VI. was the first Book of Homilles composed also in which I have some cause to think that Bishop Latimer was made use of amongst the rest as one who had subscribed the first other two books before mentioned as Bishop of Worcester Ann. 1537. and ever since continued zealous for a Reformation quitting in that respect such a wealthy Bishoprick because he neither would nor could conform his judgment to the Doctrine of the six Articles Authorized by Parliament For it will easily appear to any who is conversant in Latimers writings and will compare them carefully with the book of Homilies that they do not only savour of the same spirit in point of Doctrine but also of the same popular and familiar stile which that godly Martyr followed in the course of his preachings for though the making of these Homilies be commonly ascribed and in particular by Mr. Fox to Archbishop Cranmer yet it is to be understood no otherwise of him thad than it was chiefly done by encouragement and direction not sparing his own hand to advance the work as his great occasions did permit That they were made at the same time with King Edwards first Liturgy will appear as clearly first by the Rubrick in the same Liturgy it self in which it is directed Let. of Mr. Bucer to the Church of England that after the Creed shall follow the Sermon or Homily or some portion of one of them as they shall be hereafter divided It appears secondly by a Letter writ by Martin Bucer inscribed To the holy Church of England and the Ministers of the same in the year 1549. in the very beginning whereof he lets them know That their Sermons or Homilies were come to his hands wherein they godlily and effectually exhort their people to the reading of Holy Scripture that being the scope and substance of the first Homily which occurs in that book and therein expounded the sense of the faith whereby we hold our Christianity and Justification whereupon all our help censisteth and other most holy principles of our Religion with most godly zeal And as it is reported of the Earl of Gondomar Ambassador to King James from the King of Spain that having seen the elegant disposition of the Rooms and Offices in Burleigh House not far from Stanford erected by Sir William Cecil principal Secretary of State and Lord Treasurer to Queen Elizabeth he very pleasantly affirmed That he was able to discern the excellent judgment of the great Statesman by the neat contrivance of his house So we may say of those who composed this book in reference to the points disputed A man may easily discern of what judgment they were in the Doctrine of Predestination by the method which they have observed in the course of these Homilies Beginning first with a discourse of the misery of man in the state of nature proceeding next to that of the salvation of man-kind by Christ our Saviour only from sin and death everlasting from thence to a Declaration of a true lively and Christian saith and after that of good works annexed unto faith by which our Justification and Salvation are to be obtained and in the end descending unto the Homily bearing this inscription How dangerous a thing it is to fall from God Which Homilies in the same form and order in which they stand were first authorized by King Edward VI. afterwards tacitly approved in the Rubrick of the first Liturgy before remembred by Act of Parliament and finally confirmed and ratified in the book of Articles agreed upon by the Bishops and Clergy of the Convocation Anno 1552. and legally confirmed by the said King Edward Such were the hands and such the helps which co-operated to the making of the two Liturgies and this book of Homilies but to the making of the Articles of Religion there was necessary the concurrence of the Bishops and Clergy Assembled in Convocation in due form of Law amongst which there were many of those which had subscribed to the Bishops book Anno 1537. and most of those who had been formerly advised with in the reviewing of the book by the Commandment of King Henry VIII 1543. To which were added amongst others Dr. John Point Bishop of Winchester an excellent Grecian well studied with the ancient Fathers and one of the ablest Mathematicians which those times produced Dr. Miles Coverdale Bishop of Exon who had spent much of his time in the Lutheran Churches amongst whom he received the degree of Doctor Mr. John Story Bishop of Rochester Ridley being then preferred to the See of London from thence removed to Chichester and in the end by Queen Elizabeth to the Church of Hereford Mr. Rob. Farran Bishop of St. Davids and Martyr a man much favoured by the Lord Protector Sommerset in the time of his greatness and finally not to descend to those of the lower
Christ came to be a Lamb without spot who by the Sacrifice of himself once made should take away the sins of the world Than which there can be nothing more conducible to the point in hand And to this purpose also when Christ our Saviour was pleased to Authorize his Holy Apostles to preach the good Tidings of Salvations he gave them both a Command and a Commission To go unto all the World and preach the Gospel to every Creature Mark 16.15 So that there was no part of the World nor any Creature in the same that is to say no rational Creature which seems to be excluded from a Possibility of obtaining Salvation by the Preaching of the Gospel to them if with a faith unfeigned they believe the same which the Church further teacheth us in this following Prayer appointed to be used in the Ordering of such as are called to the Office of the holy Priesthood viz. Almighty God and Heavenly Father which of thine Infinite Love and Goodness toward us hast given to us thy only and most Dear Beloved Son Jesus Christ to be our Redeemer and Author of Everlasting Life who after he had made perfect our Redemption by his Death and was ascended into Heaven sent forth abroad into the world his Apostles Prophets Evangelists Doctors and Pastors by whose labour and Ministry he gathered together a great Flock in all the parts of the World to set forth the Eternal Praise of his Holy Name For these so great Benefits of thy Eternal Goodness and for that thou hast vouchsafed to call thy Servant here present to the same Office and Ministry of Salvation of Mankind we render unto thee most hearty thanks and we worship and praise thee and we humbly beseech thee by the same thy Son to grant unto all which either here or elsewhere call upon thy Name that we may shew our selves thankful to thee for these and all other thy benefits and that we may daily increase and go forward in the knowledg and faith of thee and thy Son by the Holy Spirit So that as well by these thy Ministers as by them to whom they shall be appointed Ministers thy Holy Name may be always glorified and thy Blessed Kingdom enlarged through the same thy Son our Lord Jesus Christ who liveth and reigneth with thee in the Vnity of the same Holy Spirit world without end Amen Which Form in Ordering and Consecrating Bishops Priests and Deacons I note this only by the way being drawn up by those which had the making of the first Liturgy of King Edward the sixth and confirmed by Act of Parliament in the fifth and sixth of the said King was afterwards also ratified by Act of Parliament in the eighth year of Queen Elizabeth and ever since hath had its place amongst the publick Monuments and Records of the Church of England To these I shall only add one single testimony out of the Writings of each of the three godly Martyrs before remembred the point being so clearly stated by some of our Divines commonly called Calvinists though not by the Outlandish also that any longer insisting on it may be thought unnecessary First then Bishop Cranmer tells us in the Preface to his Book against Gardiner of Winchester aforementioned That our Saviour Christ according to the will of his Eternal Father when the time thereof was fully accomplished taking our Nature upon him came into this World from the high Throne of his Father to declare unto miserable Sinners the Goodness c. To shew that the time of Grace and Mercy was come to give light to them that were in darkness and in the shadow of death and to preach and give Pardon and full Remission of sin to all his Elected And to perform the same he made a Sacrifice and Oblation of his body upon the Cross which was a full Redemption Satisfaction and Propitiation for the sins of the whole World More briefly Bishop Latimer thus The Evangelist saith When Jesus was born c. Serm. 1. Sund. after Epiph. What is Jesus Jesus is an Hebrew word which signifieth in our English Tongue a Saviour and Redeemer of all Mankind born into the World This Title and Name To save appertaineth properly and principally unto him for he saved us else had we been lost for ever Bishop Hooper in more words to the same effect That as the sins of Adam Pref. to the ten Commandments without Priviledg or Exemption extended and appertained unto all and every of Adams Posterity so did this Promise of Grace generally appertain as well to every and singular of Adams Posterity as to Adam as it is more plainly expressed where God promiseth to bless in the seed of Abraham all the people of the World Next for the point of Vniversal Vocation and the extent of the Promises touching life Eternal besides what was observed before from the Publick Liturgy we find some Testimonies and Authorities also in the Book of Homilies In one whereof it is declared That God received the learned and unlearned and casteth away none Hom. of Holy Scrip. p. 5. but is indifferent unto all And in another place more largely that the imperfection or natural sickness taken in Adam excludeth not that person from the promise of God in Christ except we transgress the limits and bounds of this Original sin by our own folly and malice If we have Christ then have we with him Hom. against fear of death p. 62. and by him all good things whatsoever we can in our hearts wish or desire as Victory over death sin hell c. The truth hereof is more clearly evidenced in the Writings of the godly Martyrs so often mentioned as first of Bishop Latimer who discourseth thus We learn saith he by this sentence that multi sunt vocati that many are called c. that the preaching of the Gospel is universal that it appertaineth to all mankind Serm. Septure that it is written in omnem terram exivit sonus eorum through the whole world their sound is heard Now seeing that the Gospel is universal it appeareth that he would have all mankind be saved that the fault is not in him if they be damned for it is written thus Deus vult omnes homines salvos fieri God would have all mankind saved his salvation is sufficient to save all mankind Thus also in another place That the promises of Christ our Saviour are general they appertain to all mankind He made a general Proclamation saying Qui credit in me 1 Serm Lincol habet vitam aeternam Whosoever believeth me hath eternal life And not long after in the same Sermon That we must consider wisely what he saith with his own mouth Venite and me omnes Hook pres to Commo c. Mark here he saith mark here he saith Come all ye wherefore should any body despair or shut out himself from the promises of Christ which be general and appertain to the whole
from time to time though possibly a great part of them might be present and consenting also 1552. Nor stood this book nor the Article of Freewill therein contained upon the order and authority only of this Convocation but had as good countenance and encouragement to walk abroad as could be superadded to it by an Act of Parliament as appears plainly by the Kings Preface to that Book and the Act it self to which for brevity sake I refer the Reader But if it be replyed that there is no relying on the Acts of Parliament which were generally swayed changed and over-ruled by the power and passions of the King and that the Act of Parliament which approved this Book was repealed the first year of King Edward the sixth as indeed it was we might refer the Reader to a passage in the Kings Epistle before remembred in which the Doctrine of Freewill is affirmed to have been purged of all Popish Errors concerning which take here the words of the Epistle Epist Ded. viz. And for as much as the heads and senses of our people have been imbusied and in these days travelled with the understanding of Freewill Justification c. We have by the advice of our Clergy for the purgation of Erroneous Doctrine declared and set forth openly plainly and without ambiguity of speech the meer and certain truth of them so as we verily trust that to know God and how to live after his pleasure to the attaining of everlasting life in the end this Book containeth a perfect and sufficient Doctrine grounded and established in holy Scriptures And if it be rejoyned as perhaps it may that King Henry used to shift Opinion in matters which concerned Religion according unto interest and reason of State it must be answered that the whole Book and every Tract therein contained was carefully corrected by Archbishop Cranmer the most blessed instrument under God of the Reformation before it was committed to the Prolocutor and the rest of the Clergy For proof whereof I am to put the Reader in mind of a Letter of the said Archbishop relating to the eighth Chapter of this book in which he signified to an honourable Friend of his that he had taken the more pains in it because the Book being to be set forth by his Graces that is to say the Kings censure and judgment he could have nothing in it that Momus himself could reprehend as before was said And this I hope will be sufficient to free this Treatise of Freewill from the crime of Popery But finally if notwithstanding all these Reasons it shall be still pressed by those of the Calvinian party that the Doctrine of Freewill which is there delivered is in all points the same with that which was concluded and agreed on in the Council of Trent as appears Cap. de fructibus justificationis merito bonorum operum Can. 34. and therefore not to be accounted any part of the Protestant Doctrine which was defended and maintained by the Church of England according to the first Rules of her Reformation the answers will be many and every answer not without its weight and moment For first it was not the intent of the first Reformers to depart farther from the Rites and Doctrines of the Church of Rome than that Church had departed from the simplicity both of Doctrine and Ceremonies which had been publickly maintained and used in the Primitive times as appears plainly by the whole course of their proceedings so much commended by King James in the Conserence at Hampton Court Secondly this Doctrine must be granted also to be the same with that of the Melancthonian Divines or moderate Lutherans as was confessed by Andreas Vega one of the chief sticklers in the Council of Trent who on the agitating of the Point did confess ingenuously that there was no difference betwixt the Lutherans and the Church touching that particular And then it must be confessed also that it was the Doctrine of Saint Augustine according to that Divine saying of his Sine gratia Dei praeveniente ut velimus subsequente ne frustra velimus ad pietatis opera nil valemus which is the same of that of the tenth Article of the Church of England where it is said That without the grace of God preventing us that we may have a good will and working with us when we have that good will we can do nothing that is acceptable to him in the ways of piety So that if the Church of England must be Arminian and the Arminian must be Papist because they agree together in this particular the Melancthonian Divines amongst the Protestants yea and St. Augustine amongst the Ancients himself must be Papists also CHAP. XIII The Doctrine of the Church of England concerning the certainty or uncertainty of Perseverance 1. The certainty of Grace debated in the Council of Trent and maintained in the Affirmative by the Dominicans and some others 2. The contrary affirmed by Catarinus and his adherents 3. The doubtful resolution of the Council in it 4. The Calvinists not content with certainty of Grace quoad statum praesentem presume upon it also quoad statum suturum 5. The bounds and limits wherewith the judgment in this point ought rationally to be circumscribed 6. The Doctrine of the Church of England in the present Artìcle 7. Justified by the testimonies of Bishop Latimer Bishop Hooper and Master Tyndal 8. And proved by several arguments from the publick Liturgy 9. The Homily commends a probable and sted-fast hope But 10. Allows no certainty of Grace and perseverance in any ordinary way to the Sons of men OF all the Points which exercised the wits and patience of the School-men in the Council of Trent there was none followed with more heat between the parties than that of the certainty of Grace occasioned by some passages in the writings of Luther wherein such certainty was maintained as necessary unto justification and an essential part thereof In canvasing of which point the one part held that certainty of grace was presumption the other that one might have it meritoriously The ground of the first was Hist of the Coun of Trent fol. 205. c. that Saint Thomas Saint Bonaventure and generally the School-men thought so for which cause the major part of the Dominicans were of the same opinion besides the authority of the Doctors they alledged for reasons that God would not that man should be certain that be might not be lifted up in pride and esteem of themselves that he might not prefer himself before others as he that knoweth himself to be just would do before manifest sinners and a Christian would so become drowsie careless and negligent to do good Therefore they said that uncertainty was profitable yea and meritorious besides because it is a passion of the mind which doth afflict it and being supported is turned to merit They alledged many places of the Scripture also of Solomon that a man knoweth not
regni negotiis ac aliis tractari consuetis cum caeteris dicti regni Paribus aliis ibidem jus interessendi habentibus consulere tractare ordinare statuere diffinire ac caetera facere quae Parliamento ibidem imminent facienda In vita Gul. Courtney This put together makes enough abundantly for the proofs de jure and makes the Bishops right to have Vote in Parliament to be undeniable Let us next see whether this right of theirs be not confirmed and countenanced by continual practice and that they have not lost it by discontinuance which is my second kind of proofs those I mean de facto And first beginning with the reign of the Norman Conqueror we find a Parliament assembled in the fifth year of that King wherein are present Episcopi Abbates Comites Primates toties Angliae the Bishops Abbots Earls and the rest of the Baronage of England Matth. Paris in Williglmo 1. In the 9th year of William Rufus an old Author telleth us de regni statu acturus Episcopos Abbates quoscunque Regni proceres in unum praecepti sui sanctione egit that being to consult of the affairs of the Kingdom he called together by his Writ the Bishops Abbots and all the Peers of the Realm Eadmer hist Nov. l. 2. During the reign of Henry the 2d for we will take but one Example out of each Kings reign though each Kings reign would yield us more a Patliament was called at London wherein were many things dispatched as well so Ecclesiastical as secular nature the Bishops and Abbots being present with the other Lords Coacto apud Londoniam magno Episcoporum Procerum Abbatumque Concilio multa ecclesiasticarum secularium rerum ordinata negotia decisa litigia saith the Monk of Malmesbury Malmesb. hist reg Angl. l. 5. And of this Parliament it is I take it that Eadmer speaketh Hist Novel l. 4. p. 91. Proceed we to King Henry the 2d for King Stephens reign was so full of Wars and Tumults that there is very little to be found of Parliaments and there we find the Bishops with the other Peers convened in Parliament for the determination of the points in controversie between Alfonso K. of Castile and Sancho K. of Navarre referred by compremise to that King of England and here determined by K. Henry amongst other things habito cum Episcopis Comitibus Baronibus cum deliberatione consilio as in Roger Hoveden Hoveder Annal pars posterin Hen. 2. Next him comes Richard the first his Son during whose imprisonment by the D. of Austria his Brother John then Earl of Moriton endeavoured by force and cunning in Normandy to set the Crown on his own head which caused Hubert the Arch-bishop of Canterbury to call a Parliament Convocatis coram eo Episcois Comitibus Baronibus regni wherein the Bishops Id in Joh. Earls and Barons did with one consent agree to seiz on his Estate and suppress his power the better to preserve the Kingdom in wealth peace and safety After succeded John and he calls a Parliament wherein were certain Laws made for the defence of his Kingdom Communi assensu Archiepiscoporum Episcoporum Comitum Baronum omnium fidelium suorum Angliae by the common Council and assent of the Arch-bishops Bishops Earls Barons and the rest of his Leiges Remember what was said before touching the Writ of Summons in the said Kings time From this time till the last Parliament of King Charles there is no Kings reign of which we have not many though not all the Acts of Parliament still in print amongst us Nor is there any Act of Parliament in the printed Books to the enactig of the which the Bishops approbation and consent is not plainly spectified either in the general Prome set before the Acts or in the body of the Act it self as by the books themselves doth at large appear And to this kind of proof may be further added the form and manner of the Writ by which the Prelates in all times have been called to Parliament being the very same verbatim with that which is directed to the Temporal Barons save that the Spiritual Lords are commanded to attend to the service in fide dilectione the Temporal in fide homagio and of late times in fide legeantia A form or copy of which summons as ancient as King Johns time V. Titles of Hon. pt 2. c. 5. is still preserved upon Record directed nominatim to the Arch-bishop of Canterbury and then a scriptum est similiter to the residue of the Bishops Abbots Earls and Barons Then add the Priviledg of Parliament for themselves and their servants during the time of the Sessions the liberty to kill and take one or two of the Kings Deer as they pass by any of his Forests in coming to the Parliament upon his commandment Charta de Foresta cap. Cambden in Britannia their enjoying of the same immunities which are and have been heretofore enjoyed by the Temporaal Barons and tell me if the Bishops did not sit in Parliament by as good a Title and have not sat there longer by some hundreds of years in their Predecessors as or than any of the Temporal Lords do sit or have sat there in their Progenitours and therefore certainly Essential Fundamental parts of the Court of Parliament But against this it is objected first that some Acts have passed in Parliament to which the Prelates did not Vote not could be present in the House when the Bill was passed as in the sentencing to death or mutilation of a guilty person as doth appear both by the Laws and constitutions recognized at Clarendon and the following practice This hath been touched on before and we told you then that this restraint was laid upon them not by the Common Law of England or an Act or Ordinance of the House of Peers by which they were disabled to attend that service It was their own voluntary Act none compelled them to it but only out of a copnformity to some former Canons ad sanctorum Canonum instituta Antiqu. Brit. in Gul. Conrineâ— Constitut Othobon fol. 45. as their own words are by which it was not lawful for the Clergy-men to be either Judges or Assessors in causa Sanguinis And yet they took such care to preserve their Interests that they did not only give their Proxies for the representing of their persons but did put up their Protestation with a salvo jure for the preserving of their rights for the time to come jure Paritatis interessendi in dicto Parliamento quaod omnia singula ibi exercenda in omnibus semper salvo Antiqu. Britan. in Gul. Courtney as the manner was Examples of the which are as full and frequent as their withdrawing themselves on the said occasions But then the main Objection is that as some Acts have passed in Parliament absentibus Praelatis when the Bishops
did absent themselves of their own accord so many things have been transacted in the Parliament excluso Clero when the Clergy have been excluded or put out of the House by some Act or Ordinance A precedent for this hath been found and published by such as envied that poor remnant of the Churches honour though possibly they will find themselves deceived in their greatest hope and that the evidence will not serve to evince the cause The Author of the Pamphlet entituled The Prerogative and practice of Parliaments first laying down his Tenet that many good Acts of Parliament may be made though the Arch-bishops and Bishops should not consent unto them which is a point no man doubts of Printed at London 16.8 p. 37. consideriong how easily their Negative may be over-ruled by the far greater number in the House of Peers adds that at a Parliament holden at St. Edmundsbury 1196. in th reign of Edw. 1. a Statute was made by the King the Barons and the Commons Excluso Clero and for the proof hereof refers us unto Bishop Jewel Now Bishop Jewel saith indeed that in a Parliament solemnly holden at St. Edmundsbury by King Edward 1. An 1296. the Arch-bishops and Bishops were quite shut forth and yet the Parliament held on and good and wholesome Laws were there enacted the departing or absence of the Lords Spiritual notwithstanding In the Records whereof it is written thus Defence of the Apolog. pt 5. c. 2. §. 1. Habito Rex cum Baronibus suis Parliamento Clergo excluso statutum est c. the King keeping the Parliament with his Barons the Clergy that is to say the Arch-bishops and Bishops being shut forth it was enacted c. Wherein who doth not see if he hath any eyes that by this reason if the proof be good many good Acts of Parliament may be made though the Commons either out of absence or opposition should not consent unto them of whose consent unto that Statute whatsoever it was there is as little to be found in that Record as the concurrence of the Bishops But for Answer unto so much of this Record so often spoken of and applauded as concerns the Bishops we say that this if truly senced as I think it be not was the particular Act of an angry and offended King against his Clergy not to be drawn into Example as a proof or Argument against a most clear known and undoubted right The case stood thus A Constitution had been made by Boniface the 8th Ne aliqua collecta ex Ecclesiasticis proventibus Regi aut cuivis alii Principi concedatur Matth. Westm in Edw. 1. that Clergy-men should not pay any Tax or Tallage unto Kings or Princes our of their Spiritual preferments without the leave of the Pope under pretence whereof the Clergy at this Parliament at St. Edmundsbury refused to be contributory to the Kings occasions when the Lay-Members of the House had been forwards in it The King being herewith much offended gives them a further day to consider of it adjourning the Parliament to London there to begin on the morrow after St. Hilaries day and in the mean time commanded all their Barns to be fast sealed up The day being come and the Clergy still persisting in their former obstinacy excluso è Parlamento Clero Concilium Rex cum solis Baronibus c populo habuit totumq Antiq. Brit. in R. Winchelsey statim Clerum protectione sua privavit the King saith the Historian excluding the Clergy out of the Parliament advised with his Barons and his people only what was best to be done by whose advice he put the Clergy out of his protection and thereby forced them to conform to his will and pleasure This is the summa totalis of the business and comes unto no more but this that a particular course was advised in Parliament on a particular displeasure taken by the King against the body of his Clergy then convened together for their particular refusal to contribute to his wants and Wars the better to reduce them to their natural duty Which makes not any thing at all against the right of Bishops in the House of Peers or for excluding them that House or for the validity of such Acts as are made in Parliament during the time of such exclusion especially considering that the King shortly after called his States together Wlsingh in Edw. 1. Anno 1297. and did excuse himself for many extravagant Acts whch he had committed against the liberties of the Subject whereof this was one laying the blame thereof on his great occasions and the necessities which the Wars which he had abroad did impose upon him And so much as in answer unto that Record supposing that the words thereof be rightly senced as I think they are not and that by Clerus there we are to understand Arch-bishops and Bishops as I think we be not there being no Record I dare boldly say it either of History of Law in which the word Clerus serve to signifie the Arch-bishops and Bishops exclusive of the other Clergy or any writing whatsoever wherein it doth not either signifie the whole Clergy generally or ther inferiour Clergy only exclusive of the Arch-bishops Bishops and other Prelates Therefore in answer unto that so much applauded Cavil of Excluso Clero from what Record soever it either hath been hitherto or shall hereafter be produced I shall propose it to the consideration of the sober Reader whether by Clerus in that place or in any other of that kind and time we must not understand the inferiour Clergy as they stand distinguished in the Laws from my Lords the Bishops For howsoever it be true that Clerus in the Ecclesiastical notion of the word doth signifie the whole Clergy generally Arch-bishops Bishops Priests and Deacons yet in the legal notion of it it stands distinguished from the Prelates and signifieth only the inferiour Clergy Thus do we find the Ecclesiasticks of this Realm divided into Prelates men of Religion and other Clerks 3. Edw. 1. c. 1. the Seculars either into Prelates and Clerks 9 Edw. 2. c. 3. 1 Rich. 2. c. 3. or Prelates and Clerks Beneficed 18 Edw. 3. c. 2. or generally into the Prelates and the Clergy 9 Edw. 2. c. 15. 14 Edw. 3. c. 1. 3. 18 Edw. 3. 2.7 25 Edw. 3.2.4 8 Hen. 6. c. 1. and in all acts and grants of Subsidies made by the Clergy to the Kings or Queens of England since the 32 of Henry 8. when the Clergy Subsidies first began to be confirmed by Act of Parliament So also in the Latin ideom Regist Warham Regist Cranmer Statut. ◠Eliz c. 17. ever since Stat. 1. Phil. Mar. c. 8. which comes nearest home Nos Praelati Clerus in the submission of the Clergy to King Henry VIII and in the sentence of divorce against Anne of Cleve and in the instrument of the grant of the grant of the
their Synods as with some Laws or Ordinances which were lately passed more to the advantage of the Clergy than the common people put in a Bill to this effect viz. That no Act nor Ordinance should from thenceforth be made or granted on the petition of the said Clergy without the consent of the Commons and that the said Commons should not be bound in times to come by any constitutions made by the Clergy of this Realm for their own advantage to which the Commons of this Realm had not given consent The reason of the which is this and 't is worth the marking car eux ne veullent estre obligez a nul de vos estatuz ne Ordinances faitz sanz leur assent because the said Clergy did not think themselves bound as indeed they were not in those times by any Statute Act or Ordinance made without their Assent in the Court of Parliament Which clearly shews that in those times the Clergy had their place in Parliament as the Commons had Put all which hath been said together and tell me if it be not clear and evident that the inferiour Clergy had their place in Parliament whether the clause touching the calling of them thither were not more than verbal in the Bishops Writs and is true that in the Writ of summons directed to their several and respective Bishops they were called only ad consentiendum to manifest their consent to those Acts and Ordinances which by the Common-council of the Realm were to be ordained But then it is as true withal that sometimes their advice was asked in the weighty matters as in the 21 of King Richard the 2. and sometimes they petitioned and remonstrated for redress of grievances as in the instances and cases which were last produced And 't is as true that if they had been present only ad consentiendum to testifie their assent to those Acts which by the Common-council of the Realm were proposed unto them their presence was as necessary and their Voice as requisite to all intents and purposes for ought I can see as the Voice and presence of the Commons in the times we speak of For in the Writs of summons issued to the several Sheriffs for the electing of Knights Citizens and Burgesses to attend the Parliament it is said expresly first that the King resolveth upon weighty motives touching the weal and safety both of Church and State to hold his Parliament Forma Brevis pro summonit Parliamenti ibidem cum Praelatis Magnatibus Proceribus dicti regni nostri colloquium habere tractare then and there to advise and treat with the Prelates Peers and Nobles of this Realm Which words are also expresly used in the Writs of summons directed to the Bishops Titles of Hon. part 2. cap. 5. and to every of them who also are required in a further clause consilium suum impendere to give the King their best advice in his great affairs So that the Prelates and Nobility convened in Parliament made the Kings great Council and were called thither to that end What then belonged unto the Commons 1. No more than did belong to the Clergy also that is to say the giving of their consent to such Laws and Statutes as should there be made Which notwithstanding in Tract of time gave them such a sway and stroke in the course of Parliaments that no Law could be made nor no Tax imposed without their liking and allowance And this is that which is expressed in the last clause of the said Writ by which the Knights and Burgesses are to come prepared ad faciendum consentiendum iis quae tunc ibidem de consilio dicti Regni nostri super negotiis antedictis contigerint ordinari Forma Brevis c. Which is the very same which you had before in the Writ directed to the Bishops for summoning the Clergy of their several Diocesses and that here is a faciendum which the other had not A word which if you mark it well hath no operation in the construction of the Text except it be in paying Subsidies or doing such things as are appointed to be done by that great Council of the Kingdom Which clause though it be cunningly left out that I may say no worse in the recital of the Writ by the Author of the Book entituled The Prerogative and practice of Parliaments is most ingenuously acknowledged in the Declaration of the Lords and Commons assembled at Oxon Declaration of the Treaty p. 15. where it is said That the Writs of summons the foundation of all power in Parliament are directed to the Lords in express terms to treat and advise with the King and the rest of the Peers of the Kingdom of England and to the Commons to do and consent to those things which by that Common-council of England should be ordained And thus it stands as with the common people generally in most states of Christendom so with the Commons anciently in most states of Greece of which Plutarch telleth us Plutarch in Lâ—curgo That when the people were assembled in Council it was not lawful for any of them to put forth matters to the Council to be determined neither might any of them deliver his Opinion what he thought of any thing but the people had only authority 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to give their assent unto such things as either the Senators or their Kings do propound unto them But against this it is objected first that it is not to be found at what time the Clergy lost their place and Vote in Parliament and therefore it may reasonably be presumed that they had never any there and 2dly that if they had been called ad consentiendum though no more than so we should have found more frequent mention of their consent unto the Acts and Statutes in our printed Books For answer unto which it may first be said that to suppose the Clergy had no Voice in Parliament because it is not to be found when they lost that priviledg is such a kind of Argument if it be an argument as is made by Bellarmine Bellarm. de Eccl. lib 4. c. 5. to prove that many of the controverted Tenets of the Church of Rome are neither erroneous nor new because we cannot say expresly quo tempore quo autore when and by whose promoting they first crept in And though we cannot say expresly when the inferiour Clergy lost their place in Parliament in regard it might be lost by discontinuance or non-usage or that the clause was pretermitted for some space of time the better to disuse them from it or that they might neglect the service in regard of their attendance in the Convocation which gave them power and reputation both with the common people yet I have reason to believe that this pretermission and disuse did chiefly happen under the Government of the Kings of the House of Lancaster who being the true Heirs and
together can conclude on any thing unto the prejudice of the third Bodinus that renowned States-man doth resolve it Negatively and states it thus nihil à duobus ordinibus discerni posse quo uni ex tribus incommodum inferatur Bodin de Rep. l. 3. c. 7. si res ad singulos ordines seorsum pertinet that nothing can be done by two of the Estates to the disprofit of the third in case the point proposed be such as concerns them severally The point was brought into debate upon this occasion Henry the 3d. of France had summoned an Assembly of the three Estates or Conventus Ondinum to be held at Bloys Anno 1577. the Form and Order of the which we have at large by Thuanus Lib. 63. But finding that he could not bring his ends about so easily with that numerous body as if they were contracted to a narrower compass he caused it to be mov'd unto them that they should make choice of 36 twelve of each Estate Tonanus in hist temp l. 63. quox Rex cum de postulatis decerneret in consilium adhibere dignaretur whom the King would deign call to Council for the dispatch of such Affairs and motions as had been either moved or proposed unto him Which being very readily assented to by the Clergy and Nobility who hoped thereby to find some favour in the Court and by degrees to be admitted to the Privy Council was very earnestly opposed by Bodinus being then Delegate or Commissioner for the Province of Veromandois who saw full well that if businesses were so carried the Commons which made the third Estate would find but little hopes to have their grievances redressed â—â—iin de Rep. â— 1. c. 7. their petitions answered And therefore laboured the rest of the Commissioners not to yield unto it as being utterly destructive of the Rights and Liberties of the common people which having done he was by them intrusted to debate the business before the other two Estates and did it to so good effect that at the last he took them off from their resolution and obtained the cause What Arguments he used in particular neither himself nor Thuanus telleth us But sure I am that he insisted both on the ancient customs of the Realm of France as also of the Realm of Spain and England and the Roman Empire in each of which it was received for a ruled case nihil à duobus ordinibus statui posse quo uni ex tribus prejudicium crearetur that nothing could be done by any of the two Estates unto the prejudice of the third And if it were a ruled case then in the Parliament of England there is no reason why it should be otherwise in the present times the equity and justice of it being still the same and the same reasons for it now as forcible as they could be then Had it been otherwise resolved of in the former Ages wherein the Clergy were so prevalent in all publick Councils how easie a matter had it been for them either by joyning with all the Nobility to exclude the Commons or by joyning with the Commonalty to exclude the Nobles Or having too much conscience to adventure to so great a change an alteration so incompatible and inconsistent with the Constitution of a Parliament how easily might they have suppressed the potency and impair the Priviledges of either of the other two by working on the humours or affections of the one to keep down the other But these were Arts not known in the former days nor had been thought of in these last but by men of Ruine who were resolved to change the Government as the event doth shew too clearly both of Church and State Nor doth it help the matter in the least degree to say that the exclusion of the Bishops from the House of Peers was not done meerly by the practice of the two other Estates but by the assent of the King of whom the Laws say he can do no wrong and by an Act of Parliament whereof our Laws yet say quae nul doit imaginer chose dishonourable that no man is to think dishonourably Plowden in Commentar For we know well in what condition the King was when he passed that Act to what extremities he was reduced on what terms he stood how he was forced to flye from his City of London to part with his dear Wife and Children and in a word so overpowred by the prevailing party in the two Houses of Parliament that it was not safe for him as his case then was to deny them any thing And for the Act of Parliament so unduly gained besides that the Bill had been rejected when it was first brought unto the Lords and that the greater part of the Lords were frighted out of the House when contrary unto the course of Parliament it was brought again it is a point resolved both in Law and Reason that the Parliament can do nothing to the destruction of it self and that such Acts as are extorted from the King are not good and valid whereof we have a fair Example in the book of Statutes 15 Ed. 3. For whereasz the King had granted certain Articles pretended to be granted in the Form of a statute expresly contrary to the Laws of the Realm and his own Prerogative and Rights Royal mark it for this is just the case which he had yielded to eschew the dangers which by denying of the same were like to follow in the same Parliament it was repealed in these following words It seemed good to the said Earls Barons and other wise men that since the Statute did not proceed of our Free will the same be void and ought not to have the name nor strength of a Statute and therefore by their counsel and assent we have decreed the said Statute to be void c. Or if it should not be repealed in a formal manner yet is this Act however gotten void in effect already by a former Statute in which it was enacted in full Parliament and at the self-same place where this Act was gained that the Great Charter by which and many other Titles the Bishops held their place in Parliament should be kept in all points and if any Statute be made to the contrary 42 Ed. 3. c. 1. it shall be holden for none CHAP. VI. That the three Estates of every Kingdom whereof Calvin speaks have no Authority either to regulate the power or control the actions of the Sovereign Prince 1. The Bishops and Clergy of England not the Kings make the third Estate and of the dangerous consequences which may follow on the contrary Tenet 2. The different influence of the three Estates upon conditional Princes and an absolute Monarch 3. The Sanhedrim of no Authority over the persons or the actions of the Kings of Judah 4. The three Estates in France of how small Authority over the actions of that King 5. The King of Spain not over-ruled or
regulated by the three Estates 6. Of what Authority they have been antiently in the Parliaments of Scotland 7. The King of England always accounted heretofore for an absolute Monarch 8. No part of Sovereignty invested legally in the English Parliaments 9. The three Estates assembled in the Parment of England subordinate unto the King not co-ordinate with him 10. The Legislative power of Parliaments is properly and legally in the King alone 11. In what particulars the power of the English Parliament doth consist especially 12. The Kings of England ordinarily over-rule their Parliaments by themselves their Council and their Judges 13. Objections answered touching the power and practice of some former Parliaments and the testimonies given unto them 14. No such Authority given by God in Holy Scripture to any such Popular Magistrates as Calvin dreams of and pretends 15. The Application and Conclusion of the whole discourse I Have been purposely more copious in the former Chapter because I thought it necessary to declare and manifest who made the three Estates in each several Kingdom which are pretended by our Author to have such power of regulating the Authority and censuring the actions and the persons of their Sovereign Princes And this the rather in regard it is thought of late and more than thought presented to the world in some publick writings especially as it relates to the Realm of England that the King the Lords and Commons make the three Estates which brings the King into an equal rank with the other two in reference to the business and affairs of Parliament A fancy by what accident soever it was broached and published which hath no consistence either with truth or ordinary observation or with the practice of this Realm or of any other For the proof of this my position that the King is none of the three Estates as is now pretended if all proofs else should fail I have one from Calvin whose judgment in this point amongst many of us will be instar omnium Calvin instit 4. cap. ult For where he saith in singulis Regnis tres esse Ordines that there are three Estates in each several Kingdom and that these three Estates convened in Parliament or by what other name soever they call their meeting are furnished with a power Regum lididinem moderandi of moderating the licentiousness of Kings and Princes and that they become guilty of perfidious dissimulation si Regibus impotenter grassantibus c. If they connive at Kings when they play the Tyrants or wantonly insult on the common people I trow it cannot be conceived that the King is any one of the three Estates who are here trusted or at least supposed to be intrusted with sufficient power as well to regulate his authority as to control his actions If Calvin be allowed to have common sense and to have wit and words enough to express his meaning as even his greatest Adversaries do confess he had it must be granted that he did not take the King of what Realm soever to be any of the three Estates or if he did he would have thought of other means to restrain his insolencies than by leaving him in his own hands to his own correction Either then Calvin is mistaken in the three Estates and if he be mistaken in designing the men he aims at may he not be mistaken in the power he gives them or else the King is none and indeed can be none of the three Estates qui primarios conventus peragunt who usually convene in Parliament for those ends and purposes before remembred But not to trust to him alone though questionless he be ideoneus testis in the present case Let us behold the Assembly of the three Estates or Conventus Ordinum in France from whence it is conceived that all Assemblies of this kind had their first Original and we shall find a very full description of them in the Assembly des Estats at Bloys under Henry III. Anno 1577. of which thus Thuanus Rex in sublimi loco sub uranisco sedebat Thanus in histor sci temp l. 63. c. The King saith he sate on an high erected Throne under the Canopy of State the Queen-Mother and the Queen his Wife and all the Cardinals Princes Peers upon either hand And then it followeth Transtris infra dispositis ad dextram suam sacri Ordinis Delegati ad laevam Nobilitas infra plebetus ordo sedebat that on some lower forms there sate the Delegates of the Clergy towards the right hand of the King the Nobility towards the left and the Commissioners for the Commons in the space below We may conjecture at the rest by the view of this Of those in Spain by those Conventions of the States which before we spake of at Burgos Monson Toledo and in other places in which the King is always mentioned as a different person who called them and dissolved them as he saw occasion For Scotland it is ordinary in the stile of Parliaments to say the King and the Estates do ordain and constitute for which I do refer you to the Book of Statutes which clearly makes the King to be a different person from the Estates of that Kingdom And as for England Statutes of Scotland besides what may be gathered from the former Chapter we read in the History of Titus Livius touching the Reign and Acts of King Henry V. that when his Funerals were ended the three Estates of the Realm of England did assemble together and declared his Son King Henry VI. being an Infant of eight months old to be their Sovereign Lord Tit. Liv. M. S. in Bibl. Bodl. as his Heir and Successor And in the Parliament Rolls of King Richard III. there is mention of a Bill or Parchment presented to that Prince being then Duke of Glocester on the behalf and in the name of the three Estates of this Realm of England that is to wit of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and of the Commons by name which forasmuch as neither the said three Estates nor the persons which delivered it on their behalf were then Assembled in form of Parliament was afterwards in the first Parliament of that King by the same three Estates Assembled in this present Parliament I speak the very words of the Act it self and by Authority of the same enrolled Ap. Speed in K. Rich. 3. recorded and approved And at the request and by the assent of three Estates of this Realm that is to say the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons of this Land Assembled in this present Parliament and by Authority of the same it be pronounced decreed and declared that our said Sovereign Lord the King was and is the very and undoubted Heir of this Realm of England 1 Eliz. cap. 3. c. And so it is acknowledged in a Statute of 1 Eliz. cap. 3. where the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons in that Parliament assembled being said
expresly and in terminis to represent the three Estates of the Realm of England did recognize the Queens Majesty to be their true lawful and undoubted Sovereign Liege Lady and Queen This makes it evident that the King was not accounted in the times before for one of the three Estates of Parliament nor can be so accounted the present times For considering that the Lords and Commons do most confessedly make two of the three Estates and that the Clergy in another Act of Parliament of the said Queens time are confessed to be one of the greatest States of the Realm which Statute being still in force Statut. 8. Eliz. cap. 1. doth clearly make the Clergy to be the third either there must be more than three Estates in this Kingdom which is against the Doctrine of the present times or else the King is none of the Estates as indeed he is not which was the matter to be proved But I spend too much time in confuting that which hath so little ground to stand on more than the dangerous consequences which are covered under it For if the King be granted once to be no more than one of the three Estates how can it choose but follow from so sad a principle that he is of no more power and consideration in the time of Parliament than the House of Peers which sometimes hath consisted of three Lords no more or than the House of Commons only which hath many times consisted of no more than eighty or an hundred Gentlemen but of far less consideration to all intents and purposes in the Law whatever than both the Houses joyned together What else can follow hereupon but that the King must be co-ordinate with his two Honses of Parliament and if co-ordinate then to be over-ruled by their joynt concurrence bound to conform unto their Acts and confirm their Ordinances or upon case of inconformity and non-compliance to see them put in execution against his liking and consent to his foul reproach And what at last will be the issue of this dangerous consequence but that the Lords content themselves to come down to the Commons and the King be no otherwise esteemed of than the chief of the Lords the Princeps Senatus if you will or the Duke of Venice at the best no more which if Sir Edward Dering may be credited as I think he may in this particular seems to have been the main design of some of the most popular and powerful Members then sitting with him for which I do refer the Reader to his book of Speeches Which dangerous consequents whether they were observed at first by these who first ventured on the expression or were improvidently looked over I can hardly say Certain I am it gave too manifest an advantage to the Antimonarchical party in this Kingdom and hardned them in their proceeding against their King whom they were taught to look on and esteem no otherwise than as a Joint-tenant of the Sovereignty with the Lords and Commons And if Kings have partners in the Sovereignty they are then no King such being the nature and Law of Monarchy that si divisionem capiat interitum capiat necesse est Laciant Institut Div. l. 1. c. if it be once divided and the authorities thereof imparted it is soon destroyed Such is the dangerous consequence of this new Expression that it seemeth utterly to deprive the Bishops and in them the Clergy of this Land of all future hopes of being restored again to their place in Parliament For being the Parliament can consist but of three Estates if the King fall so low as to pass for one either the Bishops or the Commons or the Temporal Lords must desert their claim the better to make way for this new pretension and in all probability the Commons being grown so potent and the Nobility so numerous and united in bloud and marriages will not quit their interesse and therefore the poor Clergy must be no Estate because less able as the World now goeth with them to maintain their Title I have often read that Constantine did use to call himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Bishop or superintendent of his Bishops Euseb de vita Constant and I have often heard our Lawyers say that the King is the general Ordinary of the Kingdom but never heard nor read till within these few years that ever any King did possess himself of the Bishops place or Vote in Parliament or sat there as the first of the three Estates as anciently the Bishops did to supply their absence By which device whether the Clergy or the King be the greater losers though it be partly seen already future times will shew This Rub removed we next proceed to the examination of that power which by our Author is conferred on the three Estates which we shall find on search and tryal to be very different according to the constitution of the Kingdom in which they are For where the Kings are absolute Monarchs as in England Scotland France and Spain Bod in de Repuô l. 1. c. the three Estates have properly and legally little more Authority than to advise their King as they see occasion to present unto his view their common grievances and to propose such remedies for redress thereof as to them seem meetest to canvass and review such erroneous judgments as formerly have passed in inferiour Courts and finally to consult about and prepare such Laws as are expedient for the publick In other Countreys where the Kings are more conditional and hold their Crowns by compact and agreement between them and their Subjects the reputation and authority of the three Estates is more high and eminent as in Polonia Denmark and some others of the Northern Kingdoms where the Estates lay claim to more than a directive power and think it not enough to advise their King unless they may dispose of the Kingdom also or at least make their King no better than a Royal Slave Thus and no otherwise it is with the German Emperors who are obnoxious to the Laws Thuan. hist sui temp l. 2. and for their Government accomptable to the Estates of the Empire insomuch that if the Princes of the Empire be persuaded in their consciences that he is likely by his mal-administration to destroy the Empire and that he will not hearken to advice and counsel ab Electorum Collegio Caesaria potestate privari potest Anonym Script ap Philip. Paraeum in Append ad Rom. 13. he may be deprived by the Electors and a more fit and able man elected to supply the place And to this purpose in a Constitution made by the Emperor Jodocus about the year 1410. there is a clause that if he or any of his Successors do any thing unto the contrary thereof the Electors and other States of the Empire sine rebellionis vel infidelitatis crimine libertatem babeant Goldast Constit Imperial Tom. 3. p. 424. should be at liberty
or if the King dislikes of any thing in it when they shew it to him it either is razed out or mended before it be prefented to the publick view King James of blessed memory who very well understood his own power and the Forms of that Parliament describes it much to the same purpose in his Speech made at Whitehall March 31. Anno 1609. About twenty days saith he before the Parliament Proclamation is made throughout the Kingdom to deliver unto the Kings Clerk of Register all Bills to be exhibited that Session before a certain day Then are they brought unto the King and perused and considered by him and only such as he alloweth of are put into the Chancellors hands to be propounded to the Parliament and none others And if any other man in Parliament speak of any other matter than is in this sort first allowed by the King the Chancellor telleth him that the King hath allowed of no such Bill Besides when they have passed them for Laws they are presented to the King and he with his Scepter put into his hands by the Chancellor must say I ratifie and approve all things done in this present Parliament And if there be any thing that he disliketh it is razed out before So the eldest Parliament-man as he said himself at that time in Scotland This was the Form of holding Parliaments in Scotland which whosoever doth consider with a serious eye may perceive most plainly that it is wholly in the Kings power to frame the Parliament to his own will or at the least to hinder it from doing any thing to the prejudice of his Royal Crown and Dignity in that the nominating of the Lords of the Articles did in a manner totally depend on him Which being observed by the Scots they took the opportunity when they were in Arms to pass an Act during the Presidency of the Lord Burley Anno 1640. for the abolition of this Order Acts of Parliaments 16 Carol and for reducing of that Parliament to the Forms of England as being thought more advantagious to their purposes than the former was So that the violent disloyalty of the Scotish Subjects their Insurrections against their Kings and murdering them sometimes when their heels were up which makes that Nation so ill spoken of in the Stories of Christendom are not to be imputed to the three Estates convened in Parliament or to any power or Act of theirs Rivet cont tenuit but only prae fervido Scotorum ingenio as one pleads it for them unto the natural disposition of that fierce and head-strong people yet easilier made subject unto Rule and Government The three Estates assembled in the Court of Parliament when in the judgment of our Author they are most fit to undertake the business have for the most part had no hand in those desperate courses And now at last we are come to England where since we came no sooner we will stay the longer and here we shall behold the King established in an absolute Monarchy from whom the meeting of the three Estates in Parliament detracteth nothing of his Power and Authority Royal. Bodin as great a Politick as any of his time in the Realm of France hath ranked our Kings amongst the absolute Monarchs of these Western parts And Cambden as renowned an Antiquary as any of the Age he lived in Bodin de Rep. l. 1. c. 8. hath told us of the King of England supremam potestatem merum imperium habere Cambden in Britan. descript That he hath supream power and absolute command in his Dominions and that he neither holds his Crown in vassalage nor receiveth his investiture of any other nor acknowledgeth any Superiour but God alone To prove this last he cites these memorable words from Bracton an old English Lawyer omnis quidem sub Rege ipse sub nullo sed tantum sub Deo that every man is under the King but the King under none saving only God But Bracton tells us more than this and affirms expresly that the King hath supream power and jurisdiction over all causes and persons in this his Majesties Realm of England that all Jurisdictions are vested in him and are issued from him and that he hath jus gladii or the right of the Sword for the better governance of his people This is the substance of his words but the words are these Bracton de leg Angl. l. 2. c 24. Sciendum est saith he quod ipse Dominus Rex ordinariam habet jurisdictionem dignitatem potestatem super omnes qui in regno suo sunt Habet enim omnia jura in manu sua quae ad coronam laicalem pertinent potestatem materialem gladium qui pertinet ad Regni gubernandum c. He adds yet further Habet item in potestate sua leges constitutiones that the Laws and Constitutions of the Realm Id. l. 2. c. 16. are in the power of the King by which words whether he meaneth that the Legislative power is in the King and whether the Legislative power be in him and in him alone we shall see anon But sure I am that he ascribes unto the King the power of interpreting the Law in all doubtful cases in dubiis obscuris Domini Regis expectanda interpretatio voluntas which is plain enough For though he speaketh only de chartis Regis expectanda interpretatio voluntas which is plain enough For though he speaketh only de chartis Regiis factis Regum of the Kings Deeds and Charters only as the words seem to import yet considering the times in which he lived being Chief Justice in the time of King Henry the 3d. wherein there was but little written Law more than what was comprehended in the Kings Grants and Charters he may be understood of all Laws whatever And so much is collected out of Bractons words by the Lord Chancellor Egerton of whom it may be said without envy that he was as grave and learned a Lawyer as ever sat upon that Bench. Who gathereth out of Bracton that all cases not determined for want of foresight are in the King to whom belongs the right of interpretation not in plain and evident cases but only in new questions and emergent doubts and that the King hath as much right by the constitutions of this Kingdom as the Civil Law gave the Roman Emperors where it is said Rex solus judicat de causa à jure non desinita Case of the Post-nati p. 107 108. And though the Kings make not any Laws without the counsel and consent of his Lords and Commons whereof we shall speak more in the following Section yet in such cases where the Laws do provide no remedy and in such matters as concern the politick administration of his Kingdoms he may and doth take order by his Proclamations He also hath Authority by his Prerogative Royal to dispense with the rigour of the Laws and
we that the Majesty of this Kingdom was first originally in the people and by them devolved upon the King by their joynt consent yet having given away that power by their said consent and setled it upon the King by an Act of State confirmed by Oaths and all Solemnities which that Act requires they cannot so retract that grant or make void that gift as to pass a new conveyance of it and settle it upon their Representees in the House of Commons Or if they could yet this would utterly exclude all the Lords from having the least share or portion in this new found Sovereignty in that they represent not the common people but sit there only in their own personal capacities and therefore must submit at last to these new made Sovereigns who carry both the Purse and Sword at their own girdles So then the people cannot give the Sovereignty and if they have no power to give it the Lords and Commons have no claim thereunto de jure See we next therefore how much of this Sovereignty they or their Predecessors rather have enjoyed de facto in peaceable and regular times fit to be drawn into example in the Ages following The chief particulars in which the Sovereignty consists we have seen before and will now see whether that any of them have been exercised and injoyed in peaceable and regular times by both or either of the two Houses of Parliament And first for calling and dissolving Parliaments making of Peers granting of liberty to Towns and Cities to make choice of Burgesses which antiently had no such liberty treating with forein States denouncing War or making Leagues or Peace after War commenced granting safe conduct and protection indenizing of Aliens giving of honours unto eminent and deserving persons Rewarding Pardoning Coyning Printing making of Corporations and dispensing with the Laws in force they are such points which never Parliament did pretend to till these later times wherein every thing almost is lawful I am sure more lawful than to fear God and honour the King Nor do I find that Mr. Prynn hath laboured to entitle them to these particulars For levying of Arms and the command of the Militia besides that the Kings of England have ever been in possession of it and that possession never disturbed or interrupted by any claim of right made in the behalf of the two Houses which is as sure a title as the Law can make the Houses have declared by an Act of Parliament Stat. 7. Ed. 1. Cap. 1. that of right it belongs unto the King streightly to defend that is prohibit all force of Arms and that the Parliament is bound to aid him in that prohibition Touching the Royal Navy and the Ports and Forts the Kings prescription to them is so strong and binding 3. Edw. 3. that in the 3d. of Edward III. the House of Commons did disclaim the having cognisance of such matters as the guarding of the Seas and marches of the Kingdom which certainly they had not done had they pretended any title to the Ports and Navy As for suppressing tumults and providing for the safety of the Kingdom against sudden danger the Law commits it solely to the care of the King 11 Henr. 7. c. 18. obliging every Subject by the duty of his allegeance to aid and assist him at all seasons when need shall require And for their power of declaring Law in the House of Peers wherein they deliver their opinion in the point before them in true propriety of speech they have none at all Case of our Affairs p. 4. And this is that which was affirmed by his Majesty at the end of the Parliament Anno 1628. saying that it belonged only to the Judges under him to interpret Laws and that none of the Houses of Parliament joynt or separate what new Doctrine soever might be raised had any power either to make or declare Law without his consent 3 Car. And if it be done with his consent it is not so properly the declaring and interpreting of an old Law as the making rather of a new saith a learned Gentleman Case of our Affairs p. 5. Others have found out a new way to invest the Parliament with the Robes of Sovereignty not as superior to the King but co-ordinate with him and this say they appears sufficiently in that the two Houses of Parliament have not only a power of consulting but of consenting and that too in the highest office of the Monarchy whereof they are a Co-ordinative part the making of Laws Fuller Answer to D.F. p. 2. Which dangerous doctrine as it was built at first on that former error which makes the King to be one of the three Estates in Parliament so it is super-structed with some necessary consequents whether more treasonable or ridiculous it is hard to say For on these grounds the Author of the Fuller Answers hath presented us with these trim devises Id. pag. 1. viz. that England is not a simple subordinate and absolute but a co-ordinative and mixt Monarchy that this mixt Monarchy is compounded of three co-ordinate Estates a King and two Houses of Parliament that these three make but one supream but that one is a mixt one or else the Monarchy were not mixt and finally which needs must follow from the premises that although every Member of the Houses seorsim taken severally may be called a Subject yet all collective in their Houses are no Subjects Auditum admissi risum teneatis Can any man hear these serious follies and abstain from laughter or think a fellow who pretends both to wit and learning should talk thus of a Monarchy which every one that knoweth any thing in Greek know to imply the supream government of one compounded of three to-ordinate Estates and those co-ordinate Estates consisting of no fewer than 600 persons Or that a man who can pretend but to so much use of reason as to distinguish him from a beast cauld fall on such a senseless dotage as to make the same man at the same time to be a Subject and no Subject a Subject in the Streets and in his private House no Subject when he sits in Haberdashers Hall for advance of moneys or in either of the two Houses of Parliament And yet this senseless doctrine is become so dangerous because so universally admired and hearkened to that the beginning and continuance of our long disturbances may chiefly be ascribed unto this opinion to which they have seduced the poor ignorant people The rather in regard that some who have undertaken the confutation of these brainless follies have most improvidently granted not only that the two Houses of Parliament are in a sort co-ordinate with the King ad aliquid to some Act or exercising of the supream power As in the book called Conscience satisfied that is to the making of Laws but that this co-ordination of the three Estates of which the King is yielded every where for
of Charters under the Great Seal or else as Proclamations of Grace and Favour so do they carry still this mark of their first procuring the King willeth the King commandeth the King ordaineth the King provideth the King grants c. And when the Kings were pleased to call their Estates together it was not out of an Opinion that they could not give away their Power or dispense their Favours or abate any thing of the severity of their former Government without the approbation and consent of their people but out of just fear lest any one of the three Estates I mean the Clergy the Nobility and the Commons should insist on any thing which might be prejudicial to the other two The Commons being always on the Craving part and suffering as much perhaps from their immediate Lords as from their King might possibly have asked some things which were as much derogatory to the Lords under whom they held as of their Sovereign Liege the King the chief Lord of all In this respect the Counsel and Consent as well of the Prelates as the Temporal Lords was accounted necessary in passing of all Acts of Grace and Favour to the people because that having many Royalties and large immunities of their own a more near relation to the person and a greater interesse in the honour of their Lord the King nothing should pass unto the prejudice and diminution of their own Estates or the disabling of the King to support his Sovereignty And this for long time was the Stile of the following Parliaments viz. To the honour of God and of holy Church Preface an 1 Ed. 3. and to the redress of the oppressions of the people our Sovereign Lord the King c. at the request of the Commonalty of his Realm by their Petition made before him and his Council in the Parliament by the Assent of the Prelates Earls Barons and other great men assembled in the said Parliament hath granted for him and his Heirs c. To this effect but with some little and but a very little variation of the words was the usual Stile in all the Prefaces or Preambles of the Acts of Parliament from the beginning of the Reign of King Edward the 3d till the beginning of the Reign of King Henry the 7th save that sometimes we find the Lords complaining 10 Ed. 3. c. 21 Ed. 3. c. 28 Ed. 3. c. or petitioning and the Commons assenting as their occasion did require and sometime also no other motive represented but the Kings great desire to provide for the ease and safety of his people upon deliberation had with the Prelates and Nobles and learned men assisting with their mutual Counsel 23 Ed. 3. And all this while there is no question to be made but that the power of making Laws was conceived to be the chiefest Flower of the Royal Diadem to which the Lords and Commons neither joint nor seperate did not pretend the smallest Title more than petitioning for them or assenting to them it being wholly left to the Kings Grace and goodness whether he would give ear or not to their Petitions or hearken unto such Advice as the Lords or other great men gave him in behalf of his people And this is that which was declared in the Parliament by the Lords and Commons and still holds good as well in point of Law as Reason that it belonged unto the regality of the King to grant or deny what Petitions in Parliament be pleaseth But as the Kings came in upon doubtful Titles 2 Hen. 5. or otherwise were necessitated to comply with the peoples humours as sometimes they were so did the Parliaments make use of the opportunities for the encrease of their Authority at least in the formalities of Law and other advantages of expression So that in the minority of King Henry the sixth unto those usual words by the advice and assent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and at the special instance and request of the Commons which were inserted ordinarily into the body of the Acts from the beginning of the Reign of King Henry the sixth was added this By the Authority of the said Parliament But still it is to be observed 3 Hen. 6. c. 2. 8 H. 6.3 c. that though those words were added to the former clause yet the power of granting or ordaining was acknowledged to belong to the King alone as in the places in the Margin where it is said Our Lord the King considering the premises by the advice and assent and at the request aforesaid hath ordained and granted by the Authority of the said Parliament 3 H. 6.2 and our Lord the King considering c. hath ordained and established by Authority of this Parliament 8 H. 6.3 And thus it generally stood but every general Rule may have some exceptions till the beginning of the Reign of King Henry the seventh about which time that usual clause the special instance or request of the Commons began by little and little to be laid aside and that of their advice or assent to be inserted in the place thereof for which I do refer you to the Book at large Which though it were some alteration of the former stile and that those words By the Authority of this present Parliament may make men think that the Lords and Commons did then pretend some Title unto the power of making Laws yet neither advising or assenting are so operative in the present case as to transfer the power of making Laws to such as do advise about them or assent unto them nor can the alteration of the Forms and stiles used in anitient times import an alteration of the Form of Government unless it can be shewed as I think it cannot that any of our Kings did renounce that Power which properly and solely did belong unto them or did by any solomn Act of Communication confer the same upon the Lords and Commons convened in Parliament And this is that which is resolved and declared in our Common Law where it is said Cited in the unlawfulness of resist p. 107. Le Roy fait les loix avec le consent du Seigneurs et communs et non pas les Seigneurs et communs avec le consent du Roy that is to say that the King makes Laws in Parliament by the assent of the Lords and Commons and not the Lords and Commons by the assent of the King And for a further proof of this and for the clearing of this point that the Lords and Commons pretend to no more power in the making of Laws than opportunity to propound and advise about them and on mature advice to give their several Assents unto them we need but look into the first Act of the Parliament in the third year of K. Charles being a Recognition of some ancient rights belonging to the English Subject An Act conceived according to the Primitive Form Statut. 3 Carol. in
times the Kings did graciously vouchsafe to pass the whole Bill in that Form which the Houses gave it or to reject it wholly as they saw occasion yet still the Privy Council and the Judges and the Council learned in the Laws have and enjoy their place in the House of Peers as well for preservation of the Kings Rights and Royalties as for direction to the Lords in a point of Law if any case of difficulty be brought before them on which occasions the Lords are to demand the Opinion of the Judges and upon their Opinions to ground their Judgment As for Example In the Parliament 28 of Hen. VI. The Commons made suit that William de la Pole Duke of Suffolk should be committed to Prison for many Treasons and other Crimes and thereupon the Lords demanded the Opinion of the Judges 28 Hen. 6. whether he should be committed to Prison or not whose Answer was that he ought not to be committed in regard the Commons had not charged him with any particular offence but with generals only which Opinion was allowed and followed In another Parliament of the said King held by Prorogation one Thomas Thorpe the Speaker of the House of Cemmons was in the Prorogation-time condemned in 1000 l. damages upon an Action of Trespass at the suit of Richard Duke of York and was committed to Prison for execution of the same The Parliament being reassembled the Commons made suit to the King and Lords to have their Speaker delivered to them according to the Privilege of Parliaments The priviled of the Barons p. 15. the Lords demanded the Opinion of the Judges in it and upon their Answer did conclude that the Speaker should stilll remain in Prison according to Law notwithstanding the privilege of Parliament and according to this resolution the Commons were commanded in the Kings name to chuse one Tho. Carleton for their Speaker which was done accordingly Other Examples of this kind are exceeding obvious and for numbers infinite yet neither more in number nor more obvious than those of our Kings serving their turns by and upon their Parliaments as their occasions did require For not to look on higher and more Regal times we find that Richard the 2d a Prince not very acceptable to the Common people could get an Act of Parliament 21 Ric. 2. to confirm the extrajudicial Opinion of the Judges given before at Notingham that King Henry IV. could by another Act reverse all that Parliament entail the Crown to his posterity 1 Hen. 4. and keep his Dutchy of Laneaster and all the Lands and Scigneuries of it from being united to the Crown that King Edward the 4th could have a Parliament to declare all the Kings of the House of Lancaster to be Kings in Fact but not in Right 1 Ed. c. 1. and for uniting of that Dutchy to the Crown Imperial notwithstanding the former Act of separation that King Richard the 3d could have a Parliament to bastardize all his Brothers Children Speeds Hist in K. Richard 3. Verulams Hist of K. Hen. 7. 11 Hen. 7. c. 10. to set the Crown on his own Head though a most bloody Tyrant and a plain Usurper that K. Henry VII could have the Crown entailed by an Act of Parliament to the issue of his own body without relation to his Queen of the House of York which was conceived by many at that time to have the better Title to it another for paying a Benevolence which he had required of the Subject though all Benevolences had been damned by a former Statute made in the short but bloudy reign of King Richard the 3d that King Henry VIII could have one Act of Parliament to bastardry his Daughter Mary in favour of the Lady Elizabeth 65 Hen. 8. c. 22 28. c. 7. 35 H. 8. c. 1. another to declare the Lady Elizabeth to be illegitimate in expectation of the issue by Queen Jane Seymour a third for setling the succession by his Will and Testament and what else he pleased that Queen Mary could not only obtain several Acts in favour of her self and the See of Rome but for the setling of the Regency on the King of Spain 1 Mar. ses 2. c. 1 2. 1. 2 Ph. M. c. 8.10 in case the Children of that Bed should be left in non-age And finally that Queen Elizabeth did not only gain many several Acts for the security of her own Person which were determinable with her life but could procure an Act to be passed in Parliament for making it high Treason to affirm and say That the Queen could not by Act of Parliament bind and dispose the Rights and Titles which any person whatsoever might have to the Crown 13 Eliz. c. 1. And as for raising moneys and amassing Treasures by help of Parliaments he that desires to know how well our Kings have served themselves that way by the help of Parliaments let him peruse a book entituled the Privilege of Parliaments writ in the manner of Dialogue between a Privy Counsellor and a Justice of Peace and he shall be satisfied to the full Put all that hath been said together and sure the Kingdom of England must not be the place in which the three Estates convened in Parliament have power to regulate the King or restrain his actions or moderate his extravagances or where they can be taxed for persidious treachery of they connive at Kings when they play the Tyrants or wantonly insult on the Common-people or otherwise abuse that power which the Lord hath given them Calvin was much mistaken if he thought the contrary or if he dreamt that he should be believ'd on his ipse dixit without a punctual enquiry into the grounds and probability of such a dangerous intimation as he lays before us But against this it is objected that Parliaments have disposed of the Militia of the Kingdom of the Forts Castles Ports and the Navy Royal not only without the Kings leave but against his liking that they have deposed some Kings and advanced others to the top of the Regal Throne And for the proof of this they produce Examples out of the Reign of King Henry III. Edw. II. and King Richard the second Examples which if rightly pondered do not so much prove the Power as the Weakness of Parliaments in being carried up and down by the private conduct of every popular pretender For 't is well known that the Parliaments did not take upon them to rule or rather to over-look K. Henry III. but as they were directed by Simon Montfort Earl of Leicester who having raised a potent faction in the State by the assistance of the Earls of Glocester Matth. Paris Henr. 3. Hereford Derby and some others of the great Lords of the Kingdom compelled the King to yield unto what terms he pleased and made the Parliaments no other than a means and instrument to put a popular gloss on his wretched purposes And
't is well known that the ensuing Parliaments which they instance in moved not of their own accord to the deposing of K Edw. the 2d or K. Richard the 2d but sailed as they were steered by those powerful Councils which Qu. Isabel in the one Walsingham in Hist Angl. Hypodig Neustriae and Henry Duke of Lancaster in the other did propose unto them It was no safe resisting those as their cold wisdoms and forgotten loyalties did suggest unto them qui tot legionibus imperarent who had so many thousand men in Arms to make good their project and they might think as the poor-spirited Citizens of Samaria did in another case but a case very like the present Behold two Kings stood not before him 2 Kings 10.4 how then can we stand For had it been an Argument of the power of Parliaments that they deposed one King to set up another dethroned King Richard to advance the Duke of Lancaster to the Regal Diadem they would have kept the House of Lancaster in possession of it for the full demonstration of a power indeed and not have cast them off at the first attempt of a new plausible pretender declared them to be kings in fact but not in right whose lawful right they had before preferred above all other Titles and set the Crown upon the heads of their deadly Enemies In the next place it is objected that Parliaments are a great restraint of the Sovereign power according to the Doctrine here laid down by Calvin in that the King can make no Laws nor levy any money upon the Subject but by the counsel and assent of the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament But this Objection hurts as little as the former did For Kings to say the truth need no Laws at all In all such points wherein they have not bound themselves by some former Laws made for the common use and benefit of the Subject they are left at liberty and may proceed in governing the people given by God unto them according to their own discretion and the advice of their Council New Laws are chiefly made for the Subjects benefit at their desire on their importunate requests for their special profit not one in twenty nay I dare boldly say not one in an hundred made for the advantage of the King either in the improvement of his power or the encrease of his Revenue Look over all the Acts of Parliaments from the beginning of the reign of King Henry III. to the present time and tell me he that can if he finds it otherwise Kings would have little use of Parliaments and less mind to call them if nothing but the making of new Laws were the matter aimed at And as for raising Moneys and imposing Taxes it either must suppose the Kings to be always unthrifts that they be always indigent and necessitous and behind-hand with the World which are the ordinary effects of ill husbandry or else this Argument is lost and of little use For if our Kings should husband their Estates to the best advantage and make the best benefit of such Escheats and forfeitures and confiscations as day by day do fall unto them If they should follow the Example of K. Henry VII and execute the penal Laws according to the power which those Laws have given them and the trust reposed in them by their People if they should please to examine their Revenue and proportion their expence to their comings in there would be little need of Subsidies and supplies of money more than the ordinary aids and impositions upon Merchandize which the Law alloweth of and the known rights of Sovereignty backed by prescription and long custom have asserted to them So that it is by Accident not by and Nature that the Parliament hath any power or opportunity to restrain their King in this particular for where there is no need of asking there is no occasion of denying by consequence no restraint upon no baffle or affronting offered to the Regal power And yet the Sovereign need not fear if he be tolerably careful of his own Estate that any reasonable demand of his in these money-matters will meet with opposition or denial in his Houses of Parliament For whilest there are so many Acts of Grace and Favour to be done in Parliament as what almost in every Parliament but an enlargement of the Kings favours to his people and that none can be done in Parliament but with the Kings siat and consent there is no question to be made but that the two Houses of Parliament will far sooner chuse to supply the King as all wise Parliaments have done than rob the Subject of the benefit of his Grace and Favours which is the best fruit they reap from Parliaments Finally whereas it is Objected but I think it in sport that the old Lord Burleigh used to say that he knew not what a Parliament in England could not do and that K. James once said in a Parliament that then there were 500 Kings which words were taken for a Concession that all were Kings as well as he in a time of Parliament they who have given us these Objections do either misunderstand their Authors or abuse themselves For what the Lord Burleigh said of Parliaments though it be more than the wisest man alive can justifie he spake of Parliaments according as the word is used in its proper sense not for the two Houses or for either of them exclusive of the Kings presence and consent but for the supream Court for the highest Judicatory consisting of the Kings most excellent Majesty the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Representees of the Commons and then it will not serve for the turn intended And what King James said once in jest though I have often heard it used in earnest upon this occasion was spoken only in derision of some daring Spirits who laying by the modesty of their Predecessors would needs be looking into the Prerogative or finding Errors and mistakes in the present Government or medling with those Arcana imperii which former Parliaments beheld at distance with the eye of Reverence But certainly King James intended nothing less than to acknowledg a co-ordinative Sovereignty in the two Houses of Parliament or to make them his Co-partners in the Regal power His carriage and behaviour towards them in the whole course of his Government clearly shews the contrary there never being Prince more jealous in the points of Sovereignty nor more uncapable of a Rival in those points than he But yet the main Objection which we may call the Objection paramount doth remain unanswered For if the three Estates convened in Parliament or any other popular Magistrate whom Calvin dreams of be ordained by the Word of God as Guardians of the peoples Liberties and therefore authorized to moderate and restrain the power of Kings as often as they shall invade or infringe those liberties as Calvin plainly says they were or that they know
Courts Coke Institutes part 4 p. 45. out of the Records of Parliament and in his Margent pointing to the 13th of King Edward the third doth instruct us thus viz. Abbates Priores aliosque Praelatos quoscunque per Baroniam de Domino Rege tenentes pertinet in Parliamentis Regni quibuscunq ut pates Regni praedicti personaliter interesse ibique de Regni negotiis ac aliis tractari consuetis cum caeteris dicti Regni Paribus aliis ibidem jus interessendi habentibus consulere tractare ordinare statuere definire ac caetera facere quae Parliamenti tempore imminent facienda Which if it be the same with that which we had before differing only in some words as perhaps it is yet we have gained the Testimony of that Learned Lawyer whose judgment in this Case must be worth the having For hear him speaking in his own words and he tells us this viz. Coke Institut fol. 4. That every Lord of Parliament either Spiritual as Arch-bishops and Bishops or Temporal as Dukes Marquesses Earls Viscounts and Barons Peers of the Realm and Lords of Parliament ought to have several Writs of Summons where plainly these words Peers and Lords of Parliament relate as well to Spiritual as to the Temporal Lords And therefore if the Arch-bishops and the Bishops may be granted to be Lords of Parliament they must be also granted to be Peers of the Realm Now to the Testimony and Authority of particular persons we shall next add the sentence and determination of our Courts of Law in which the Bishops are declared to be Peers of the Realm and to be capable of all the priviledges which belong to the Peerage For first in the aforesaid Case of the Bishop of Winchester when he was brought upon his Trial for departing from the service of the Parliament without leave of the King and pleaded sor himself quod esset unus è Paribus Regni c. The priviledg of Barony It was supposed clearly both by Court and Council that he was a Peer that part of his defence being not gainsayed or so much as questioned So in the Year-Books of the Reign of King Edward the 3d in whose Reign the Bishop of Winchester's Case was agitated as before is said a Writ of Wards was brought by the Bishop of London and by him pleaded to an Issue and the Defendant could not be Essoyned or have day of Grace for it was said that a Bishop was a Peer of the Land haec erat causa saith the Book which reports the Case In the like Case upon an Action of Trespass against the Abbot of Abbingdon who was one of the Lords Spiritual day of Grace was denied against him because he was a Peere de la Terre So also it is said expresly that when question was made about the returning of a Knight to be of a Jury where a Bishop was Defendant in a Quare impedit the Rule of the Court was that it ought to be so because the Bishop was a Peer of the Realm And in the Judgment given against the Bishop of Norwich in the time of Richard the 2d he is in the Roll expresly allowed to be a Peer for he had taken exceptions that some things had passed against him without the Assent or knowledg of his Peers of the Realm To which Exception it was Answered that it behoved him not at all to plead that he was a Prelate for traversing such Errors and misprisions as in the quality of a Souldier who had taken wages of the King were committed by him Thus also in the Assignment of the Errors under Henry the fifth for the Reversal of the Attainder of the Earl of Salisbury one Error is assigned that Judgment was given without the consent of the Prelates which were Peers in Parliament And although that was adjudged to be no Error yet was it clearly allowed both in the Roll and the Petitions that the Bishops were Peers Finally in the Government of the Realm of France the Bishops did not only pass in the Ranks of Peers but six of them were taken into the number of the Douze-pairs or twelve Peers of that Kingdom highly esteemed and celebrated in the times of Charlemayne that is to say the Arch-bishop and Duke of Rhemes the Bishop and Duke of Laon the Bishop and Duke of Langres the Bishop and Earl of Beuvois the Bishop and Earl of Noyon the Bishop and Earl of Chalons And therefore it may be inferred that in the Government established by the Anjovin and Norman Kings the English Bishops might be ranked with the Peers at large considering their place in Parliament and their great Revenues and the strong influence which they had on the Church and State But there is little need for Inferences and book-Cases and the Authorities of particular men to come in for Evidence when we are able to produce an Act of Parliament to make good the point For in the Statute made the 4th year of King Henry the fifth it was repeated and confirmed That no man of the Irish Nation should be chosen by Election to be an Arch-bishop Bishop Abbot or Frior nor in no other manner received or accepted to any dignity and benefice within the said Land c. The Reason of which inhibition is there said to be this viz. because being Peers of the Parliament of the said Land they brought with them to the Parliaments and Councils holden there some Irish servants whereby the privities of the Englishmen within the same Land have been and be daily discovered to the Irish people Rebels to the King to the great peril and mischief of the Kings lawful Liege people in the said Land And if the Bishops and Arch-bishops of Ireland had the name of Peers there is no question to be made but the name of Peers and the right of Peerage may properly be assumed or challenged by them Now as this Statute gives them the name of Peers so in an Act of Parliament in the 25th year of King Henry the 8th they are called the Nobles of your Realm as well Spiritual as Temporal as all your other Subjects now living c. Which Term we find again repeated by the Parliament following the Nobles Spiritual and Temporal and that twice for failing so that we find no Title given to Earls and Barons Nobles and Peers and Lords as the Statutes call them but what is given to the Bishops in our Acts of Parliament and certainly had not been given them in the stile of that Court had any question then been made of their Right of Peerage And that their calling had not raised them to a state of Nobility concerning which take this from the Lord Chief Justice Coke for our more assurance and he will tell us that the general division of persons by the Law of England is either one that is Noble and in respect of his nobility of the Lords House of Parliament or one of the Commons of the
Rituals The Papists of the two the more moderate Adversary and such whose edg was sooner taken off from the prosecution of the Quarrel than the others were For though the first Liturgy of King Edward the sixth compiled by many Learned and Religious persons was cryed up both by Act of Parliament 2.3 â—d 6. cap. 1. and by Fox himself as done by the especial aid of the holy Ghost yet it gave no small offence to some scrupulous Men who relished nothing that related to the Antient Forms And when by the Authority of Calvin the opposition in conformity of Bishop Hooper and the great power and policy of John Earl of Warwick after Duke of Northumberland it was brought under a Review and altered in such things as were thought offensive yet then it would not down neither with those tender stomachs Witness the troubles raised to the English Church at Francford in Queen Maries days by Knox Whittingham and their Associates at their returning from Geneva and the definitive sentence of Calvin in it to whom it was thought good to refer the Difference And he accordingly declares to content his followers In Liturgia Anglicana multas esse tolerabiles ineptias that he found in it very many tolerable follies Calv. Epist Anno 15 55. Reliquias Papisticae faecis the very dregs of Popery as he afterwards calls it Brought to a Review in Queen Elizabeths time and purged of a passage in the Letany which gave distast unto the Papists it grew into such general esteem and reputation as being fitted to the common Principles of Christianity in which all parties did agree that Pius the fourth Anno 1560. made offer by Parpatio Abbot of St. Saviours whom he sent with Letters to the Queen Liturgiam Anglicam Authoritate sua confirmaturum Cambd. in Annal Eliz. to ratifie and confirm the same by his Authority The Scots obliged themselves by a publick Subscription to observe the same Religionis cultui Ritibus cum Anglis communibus subscripserant as we read in Buchannan the fancy of Extemporary Prayer not being then taken up Histor Scot. lib. 19. as is affirmed by Knox himself in his Scottish History So grateful was it for a time to all sorts of people that the Papists for the first ten years of Queen Elizabeths Reign did diligently frequent the Church and attend the publick Services and performance of it as is affirmed by Sir Edward Coke in his charge given at the Assizes held at Norwich and in his Speech against Garnet and the other Traytors Anno 1605. And this not spoken on vulgar hear-say but on his own certain knowledg and observation he having noted Bedding field Cornwallis and divers others of that party to repair frequently to the Church without any scruple And though we may take this well enough on so good Authority yet may it possibly find more credit because averr'd by Queen Elizabeth herself in her Instructions to Sir Francis Walsingham bearing date August 11. Anno 1570. In which it is affirmed expresly of the Heads of that party and therefore we may judge the like of the Members also that they did ordinarily resort from the beginning of her Reign in all open places to the Churches and to divine services in the Church without contradiction or shew of misliking But in the year 1568. Sanders and others of the Popish Emissaries began to practise on that party under pretence of doing service to the Catholick Cause as Button Bellingham Compl. Embassad l. 4. and Benson sticklers for the Genevian Interesse did upon those who were inclinable to their Opinions And they so far prevailed on their several Partisans Cambd. Annal 1568. that about two years after upon the coming out of the Bull of Pope Pius Quintus against the Queen the Papists generally withdrew themselves from that conformity and came no longer to our Churches as before they had done And on the other side the Puritans as they then began to call them animated by Cartwright and the rest of their Leaders did separate themselves also from the Congregation declaming in their frequent Pamphlets against the Liturgy as superstitious and impure and altogether savouring of the Romish Missals Favoured underhand by Arch-bishop Grindal and openly countenanced by the Earl of Leicester they became so confident at the last that some of their Leaders being demanded by an Honourable Counsellor if the abolition of some Ceremonies would not serve their turn they answered with arrogancy enough Ne ungulam esse relinquendam that they would not leave so much as a Hoof behind But notwithstanding this strong vapour partly by the constancy and courage of Arch-bishop Whitgift who succeeded Grindal Anno 1583. the opportune death of the Earl their Patron Anno 1588. and the incomparable pains of judicious Hooker Anno 1595. but principally by the seasonable Execution of Copping and Hacker hanged at St. Edmondsbury in Suffolk for publishing the Pamphlets of Rob. Brown against the Book of Common Prayer pouer publier le liveres de Rob. Brown en countre le Livre de Commune Prayer as Compton doth report the Case in his Lawyers French they become so quiet Compton in his Office of Justices that the Church seemed to be restor'd to some hopes of peace No Libelling or Seditious preachings no great disturbance after this for some years together the Brethren turning their assaults into underminings and enterprising that by practice which they had found impossible to be gained by violence By which means having formed their party prepared their way by some new Libels back'd by the Scots and countenanced by some leading members in both Houses of Parliament Anno 1640. they brake out again the Smectymnuans openly appearing in the way of Argument while others of more Brains and Power managed the business for them in their several Houses The Liturgy by the one affirmed to have been intended by the first Reformers to be an help only to the want or weakness of a Minister and not to be imposed on any but such as would confess themselves unable to pray without it by some resembled unto Crutches and such like helps to insufficiency not to be made use of but by those only who otherwise could make no use of their legs reproached by their vulgar followers with the name of Pottage a dish to stay their stomachs till the meat came in all Offices of Piety reduced to Preaching and all Devotion to the Prayer of the Preachers making To this extremity were things brought when for the reasons elsewhere specified I took in hand the Answer to the Humble-Remonstrance Pref. to the Tract of Liturgies in which I found the whole building as to this particular to be laid on this foundation viz. that if by Liturgy we understand prescribed and stinted Forms of Administration composed by some and imposed upon all the rest Smectym Answ pag. 6. then they are sure that no such Liturgy had been used anciently by
most eminent Divines of all the Kingdom to come before him whom he required freely and plainly to declare as well what their opinion was of the aforesaid Pamphlets as what they did think fit to be done concerning the Translation of the Bible into the English Tongue And they upon mature advice and deliberation unanimously condemned the aforesaid Books of Heresie and Blasphemy no smaller crime then for translating of the Scriptures into the English tongue they agreed all with one assent that it depended wholly on the will and pleasure of the Sovereign Prince who might do therein as he conceived to be most agreeable to his occasions but that with reference to the present estate of things it was more expedient to explain the Scripture to the people by the way of Sermons than to permit it to be read promiscuously by all sorts of men yet so that hopes were to be given unto the Laily that if they did renounce their errours and presently deliver to the hands of his Majesties Officers all such Books and Bibles which they conceived to be translated with great fraud and falshood and any of them had in keeping his Majesty would cause a true and catholike Translation of it to be published in convenient time for the use of his Subjects This was the sum and substance of the present Conference which you shall find laid down at large in the Registers of Arch-Bishop Warham And according to this advice the King sets out a Proclamation not only prohibiting the buying reading or translating of any the aforesaid Books but straitly charging all his Subjects which had any of the Books of Scripture either of the Old Testament or of the New in the English Tongue to bring them in without delay But for the other part of giving hopes unto the people of a true Translation if they delivered in the false or that at least which was pretended to be false I find no word at all in the Proclamation That was a work reserved unto better times or left to be solicited by the Bishops themselves and other Learned men who had given the counsel by whom indeed the people were kept up in hope that all should be accomplished unto their desires And so indeed it proved at last For in the Convocation of the year 1536. the Authority of the Pope being abrogated and Cranmer fully settled in the See of Canterbury the Clergy did agree upon a form of Petition to be presented to the King That he would graciously indulge unto his Subjects of the Laity the reading of the Bible in the English Tongue and that a new Translation of it might be forthwith made for that end and purpose According to which godly motion his Majesty did not only give Order for a new Translation which afterwards He authorized to be read both in publique and private but in the interim he permitted CROMWEL his Vicar General to set out an Injunction for providing the whole Bible both in Latine and English after the Translation then in Use which was called commonly by the name of Matthews Bible but was no other than that of Tindal somewhat altered to be kept in every Parish-Church throughout the Kingdom for every one that would repair thereunto and caused this mark or character of Authority to be set upon them in red Letters Set forth with the Kings most gracious Licence which you may see in Fox his Acts and Monuments p. 1248. and 1363. Afterwards when the new Translation so often promised and so long expected was compleat and finished Printed at London by the Kings Authority and countenanced by a grave and pious Preface of Arch-Bishop Cranmer the King sets out a Proclamation dated May 6. Anno 1541. Commanding all the Curates and Parishioners throughout the Kingdom who were not already furnished with Bibles so authorized and translated as is before said to provide themselves before All-hallowtide next following and to cause the Bible so provided to be placed conveniently in their several and respective Churches straitly requiring all his Bishops and other Ordinaries to take special care to see his said commands put in execution And therewithal came out Instructions from the King to be published by the Clergy in their several Parishes the better to possess the people with the Kings good affection towards them in suffering them to have the benefit of such Heavenly Treasure and to direct them in a course by which they might enjoy the same to their greater comfort the reformation of their lives and the peace and quiet of the Church Which Proclamation and Instructions are still preserved in that most admirable Treasury of Sir Robert Cotton And unto these Commands of so great a Prince both Bishops Priests and People did apply themselves with such chearful reverence that Bonner even that bloody Butcher as he after proved caused six of them to be chained in several places of St. Paul's Church in London for all that were so well inclined to resort unto for their edification and instruction the Book being very chargeable because very large and therefore called commonly for distinctions sake The Bible of the greater Volum Thus have we seen the Scriptures faithfully translated into the English Tongue the Bible publickly set up in all Parish-Churches that every one which would might peruse the same and leave permitted to all people to buy them for their private Uses and read them to themselves or before their Families and all this brought about by no other means than by the Kings Authority only grounded on the advice and judgment of the Convocation But long it was not I confess before the Parliament put in for a share and claimed some interest in the work but whether for the better or the worse I leave you to judge For in the year 1542. the King being then in agitation of a League with Charles the Emperour He caused a complaint to be made unto him in this Court of Parliament That the Liberty granted to the people in having in their hands the Books of the Old and New Testament had been much abused by many false glosses and interpretations which were made upon them tending to the seducing of the people especially of the younger sort and the raising of sedition within the Realm And thereupon it was enacted by the Authority of the Parliament on whom He was content to cast the envy of an Act so contrary to his former gracious Proclamations That all manner of Books of the Old and New Testament of the crafty false and untrue Translation of Tindal be forthwith abolished and forbidden to be used and kept As also that all other Bibles not being of Tindals Translation in which were found any Preambles or Annotations other than the Quotations or Summaries of the Chapters should be purged of the said Preambles and Annotations either by cutting them out or blotting them in such wise that they might not be perceived or read And finally That the Bible be not read openly in
any Church but by the leave of the King or of the Ordinary of the place nor privately by any Women Artificers Apprentices Journey-men Husband-men Labourers or by any of the Servants of Yeomen or under with several pains to those who should do the contrary This is the substance of the Statute of the 34 and 35 Hen. 8. c. 1. Which though it shews that there was somewhat done in Parliament in a matter which concern'd Religion which howsoever if you mark it was rather the adding of the penalties than giving any resolution or decision of the points in question yet I presume the Papists will not use this for an Argument that we have either a Parliament-Religion or a Parliament Gospel or that we stand indebted to the Parliament for the Use of the Scriptures in the English Tongue which is so principal a part of the Reformation Nor did the Parliament speed so prosperously in the undertaking which the wise King permitted them to have a hand in for the foresaid ends or found so general an obedience in it from the common people as would have been expected in these Times on the like occasion but that the King was fain to quicken and give life to the Acts thereof by his Proclamation Anno 1546. which you shall find in Fox his Book fo 1427. To drive this Nail a little further The terrour of this Statute dying with H. 8. or being repealed by that of K. Ed. 6. c. 22. the Bible was again made publique and not only suffered to be read by particular persons either privatly or in the Church but ordered to be read over yearly in the Congregation as a part of the Liturgie or Divine Service Which how far it relates to the Court of Parliament we shall see anon But for the publishing thereof in Print for the Use of the people for the comfort and edification of private persons that was done only by the King at least in his Name and by His Authority And so it also stood in Q. Elizabeth's time the translation of the Bible being again reviewed by some of the most learned Bishops appointed thereunto by the Queens Commission from whence it had the name of the Bishops Bible and upon that review Reprinted by her sole Commandement and by her sole Authority left free and open to the Use of her well-affected and religious subjects Nor did the Parliament do any thing in all Her Reign with reference to the Scriptures in the English Tongue otherwise than at the reading of them in that Tongue in the Congregation is to be reckoned for a part of the English Liturgy whereof more hereafter In the translation of them into Welch or British somewhat indeed was done which doth look this way It being ordered in the Parliament 5. Eliz. c. 28. That the B. B. of Hereford St. Davids Bangor Landaff and St. Asaph should take care amongst them for translating the whole Bible with the Book of Common Prayer into the Welch or Brittish Tongue on pain of forfeiting 40 l. a piece in default hereof And to incourage them thereunto it was Enacted that one Book of either sort being so translated and imprinted should be provided and bought for every Cathedral Church as also for all Parish-Churches and Chappels of Ease where the said tongue is commonly used the Ministers to pay the one half of the price and the Parishioners the other But then you must observe withal that it had been before determined in the Convocation of the self-same year Anno 2562. That the Common-Prayer of the Church ought to be celebrated in a tongue which was understood by the people as you may see in the Book of Articles of Religion Art 24. which came out that year and consequently as well in the Welch or Brittish as in any other Which care had it been taken for Ireland also as it was for Wales no question but that people had been more generally civiliz'd and made conformable in all points to the English Government long before this time And for the new Translation of K. James his time to shew that the Translation of Scripture is no work of Parliament as it was principally occasioned by some passages in the Conference at Hampton Court without recourse unto the Parliament so was it done only by such men as the King appointed and by His Authority alone imprinted published and imposed care being taken by the Canon of the year 1603. That one of them should be provided for each several Church at the charge of the Parish No flying in this case to an Act of Parliament either to Authorize the doing of it or to impose it being done 4. Of the Reformation of Religion in points of Doctrine NExt let us look upon the method used in former Times in the reforming of the Church whether in points of Doctrine or in forms of Worship and we shall find it still the same The Clergy did the work as to them seemed best never advising with the Parliament but upon the post-fact and in most cases not at all And first for Doctrinals there was but little done in K. Henries time but that which was acted by the Clergy only in their Convocation and so commended to the people by the Kings sole Authority the matter being never brought within the cognizance of the two Houses of Parliament For in the year 1536. being the year in which the Popes Authority was for ever banished there were some Articles agreed on in the Convocation and represented to the King under the hands of the Bishops Abbots Priors and inferior Clergy usually called unto those Meetings the Original whereof being in Sir Robert Cotton's Library I have often seen Which being approved of by the King were forthwith published under the Title of Articles devised by the Kings Highness to stable Christian quietness and unity amongst the people In which it is to be observed First that those Articles make mention of three Sacraments only that is to say of Baptisme Penance and the Sacrament of the Altar And secondly That in the Declaration of the Doctrine of Justication Images honouring of the Saints departed as also concerning many of the Ceremonies and the fire of Purgatory they differ'd very much from those Opinions which had been formerly received in the Church of Rome as you may partly see by that Extract of them which occurs in Fox his Acts and Monuments Vol. 2. fol. 1246. For the confirming of which Book and recommending it to the use of the people His Majesty was pleased in the Injunctions of the year 1536. to give command to all Deans Parsons Vicars and Curates so to open and declare in their Sermons and other Collations the said Articles unto them which be under their Cure that they might plainly know and discern which of them be necessary to be believed and observed for their salvation and which do only concern the decent and politique Order of the Church And this he did upon this ground that the said
and the lawful Rights Ceremonies and Observations of the same by his Majesties advice and confirmation under the great Seal of England shall be by all his Graces Subjects fully believed obeyed observed and performed to all purposes and intents upon the pains and penalties therein to be comprized as if the same had been in express words and sentences plainly and fully made set forth declared and contained in the said Act 32 H. 8. c. 26. where note That the two Houses of Parliament were so far from medling in the matter which was then in hand that they did not so much as require to see the Determinations and Decrees of those Learned men whom his Majesty had then Assembled before they passed the present Act to bind the Subject fully to believe observe and perform the same but left it wholly to the judgment and discretion of the King and Clergy and trusted them besides with the ordaining and inflicting of such pains and penalties on disobedient and unconformable persons as to them seemed meet This ground-work laid the work went forwards in good order and at last being brought unto as much perfection as the said Arch-Bishops Bishops and other Learned men would give it without the co-operation and concurrence of the Royal assent it was presented once again to the Kings consideration who very carefully perused it and altered many things with his own hand as appears by the Book it self still extant in the famous Library of Sir Robert Cotton and having so altered and corrected it in some passages returned it to the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury who bestowed some further pains upon it to the end that being to come forth in the King's Name and by his Authority there might be nothing in the same which might be justly reprehended The business being in this forwardness the King declares in Parliament Anno 1544. being the 34 year of his Reign his zeal and care not only to suppress all such Books and Writings as were noysome and pestilent and tended to the seducing of his Subjects but also to ordain and establish a certain Form of pure and sincere Teaching agreable to God's Word and the true Doctrine of the Catholick and Apostolick Church whereunto men may have recourse for the decision of some such controversies as have in Times past and yet do happen to arise And for a preparatory thereunto that so it might come forth with the greater credit he caused an Act to pass in Parliament for the abolishing of all Books and Writings comprizing any matters of Christian Religion contrary to that Doctrine which since the year 1540. is or any time during the King's life shall be set forth by his Highness and for the punishment of all such and that too with most grievous pains which should preach teach maintain or defend any matter or thing contrary to the Book of Doctrine which was then in readiness 34 35 H. 8. c. 1. Which done he caused the said Book to be Imprinted in the year next following under the Title of A necessary Doctrine for all sorts of People prefixing a Preface thereto in his Royal Name to all his faithful and loving Subjects that they might know the better in those dangerous Times what to believe in point of Doctrine and how they were to carry and behave themselves in points of Practice Which Statute as it is the greatest Evidence which those Times afford to shew that both or either of the Houses of Parliament had any thing to do in matters which concerned Religion so it entitles them to no more if at all to any thing then that they did make way to a Book of Doctrine which was before digested by the Clergy only revised after and corrected by the Kings own hand and finally perused and perfected by the Metropolitan And more then so besides that being but one Swallow it can make no Summer it is acknowledged and confessed in the Act it self if Poulton understand it rightly in his Abridgment That recourse must be had to the Catholick and Apostolick Church for the decision of Controversies Which as it gives the Clergy the decisive power so it left nothing to the Houses but to assist and aid them with the Temporal Sword when the Spiritual Word could not do the deed the point thereof being blunted and the edge abated Next let us look upon the time of K. Ed. 6. and we shall find the Articles and Doctrine of the Church excepting such as were contained in the Book of Common-Prayer to be composed confirmed and setled in no other way then by the Clergy only in their Convocation the Kings Authority co-operating and concurring with them For in the Synod held in London Anno 1552. the Clergy did compose and agree upon a Book of Articles containing the chief Heads of the Christian Faith especially with reference to such Points of Controversie as were in difference between the Reformators of the Church of England and the Church of Rome and other Opponents whatsoever which after were approved and published by the Kings Authority They were in number 41. and were published by this following Title that is to say Articuli de quibus in Synodo London Anno 1552. ad tollendum opinionum dissentionem consensum verae Religionis firmandum inter Episcopos alios Eruditis viros Convenerat Regia authoritate in lucem Editi And it is worth our observation that though the Parliament was held at the very time and that the Parliament passed several Acts which concerned Church-matters as viz. An Act for Vniformity of Divine Service and for the Confirmation of the Book of Ordination 5 and 6 Edw. 6. c. 1. An Act declaring which days only shall be kept for Holy days and which for Fasting days C. 3. against striking or drawing weapon either in the Church or Church-yard C. 4. And finally another Act for the legitimating of the Marriages of Priests and Ministers C. 12. Yet neither in this Parliament nor in that which followed is there so much as the least syllable which reflecteth this way or medleth any thing at all with the book of Articles Where by the way if you behold the lawfulness of Priests Marriages as a matter Doctrinal or think we owe that point of Doctrine and the indulgence granted to the Clergy in it to the care and goodness of the Parliament you may please to know that the point had been before determined in the Convocation and stands determined by and for the Clergy in the 31 of those Articles and that the Parliament looked not on it as a point of Doctrine but as it was a matter practical conducing to the benefit and improvement of the Common-wealth Or if it did yet was the Statute built on no other ground-work than the Resolution of the Clergy the Marriage of Priests being before determined to be most lawful I use the very words of the Act it self and according to the Word of God by the Learned Clergy of this realm
was only by the King's Authority by vertue of the Headship or Supremacy which by way of recognition was vested in him by the Clergy either co-operating and concurring with them in their Convocations or else directed and assisted by such learned Prelates with whom he did advise in matters which concerned the Church and did relate to Reformation By virtue of which Headship or Supremacy he ordained the first and to that end caused certain Articles or Injunctions to be published by the Lord Cromwel then his Viear General Anno 1536. And by the same did he give order for the second I mean for the saying of the Letany in the English Tongue by his own Royal Proclamation Anno 1545. For which consult the Acts and Monuments fol. 1248 1312. But these were only preparations to a greater work which was reserved unto the times of K. Edw. 6. In the beginning of whose Reign there passed a Statute for the administring the Sacrament in both kinds to any person that should devoutly and humbly desire the same 1 E. 6. c. 1. In which it is to be observed that though the Statute do declare that the ministring of the same in both kinds to the people was more agreeable to the first Institution of the said Sacrament and to the common usage of the primitive Times Yet Mr. Fox assures us and we may take his word that they did build that Declaration and consequently the Act which was raised upon it upon the judgment and opinion of the best learned men whose resolution and advice they followed in it fol. 1489. And for the Form by which the said most blessed Sacrament was to be delivered to the common people it was commended to the care of the most grave and learned Bishops and others assemby the King at His Castle of Windsor who upon long wise learned and deliberate advice did finally agree saith Fox upon one godly and uniform zOrder for receiving of the same according to the right rule of Scriptures and the first use of the primitive Church fol. 1491. Which Order as it was set forth in Print Anno 1548. with a Proclamation in the name of the King to give Authority thereunto amongst the people so was it recommended by special Letters writ unto every Bishop severally from the Lords of the Council to see the same put in execution A copy of which Letters you may find in Fox fol. 1491. as afore is said Hitherto nothing done by Parliament in the Forms of Worship but in the following year there was For the Protector and the rest of the Kings Council being fully bent for a Reformation thought it expedient that one uniform quiet and godly Order should be had throughout the Realm for Officiating God's divine Service And to that end I use the words of the Act it self appointed the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury and certain of the most learned and discreet Bishops and other learned men of the Realm to meet together requiring them that having as well eye and respect to the most pure and sincere Christian Religion taught in Scriptures as to the usages in the Primitive Church they should draw and make one convenient and meet Order Rite and fashion of Common Prayer and Administration of Sacraments to be had and used in this his Majesties Realm of England Well what did they being thus assembled that the Statute tells us Where it is said that by the aid of the Holy Ghost I pray you mark this well and with one uniform agreement they did conclude upon and set forth an Order which they delivered to the Kings Highness in a Book entituled The Book of Common-Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments and other Rites and Ceremonies of the Church after the use of the Church of England All this was done before the Parliament did any thing But what was done by them at at last Why first considering the most godly travel of the King's Highness and the Lord Protector and others of his Highness Council in gathering together the said B. and learned men Secondly The Godly Prayers Orders Rites and Ceremonies in the said Book mentioned Thirdly The motive and inducements which inclined the aforesaid learned men to alter those things which were altered and to retain those things which were retained And finally taking into consideration the honour of God and the great quietness which by the grace of God would ensue upon it they gave his Majesty most hearty and lowly thanks for the same and most humbly prayed him that it might be ordained by his Majesty with the assent of the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament and by Authority of the same that the said Form of Common-Prayer and no other after the Feast of Pentecost next following should be used in all his Majesties Dominions with several penalties to such as either should deprave or neglect the same 2 and 3. E. 6. cap. 1. So far the very words of the Act it self By which it evidently appeareth that the two Houses of Parliament did nothing in the present business but impose that Form upon the people which by the learned and religious Clergy-men whom the K. appointed thereunto was agreed upon and made it penal unto such as either should deprave the same or neglect to use it And thus doth Poulton no mean Lawyer understand the Statute who therefore gives no other title to it in his Abridgement publish'd in the year 1612. than this The penalty for not using uniformity of Service and Ministration of the Sacrament So then the making of one uniform Order of celebrating divine Service was the work of the Clergy the making of the Penalties was the work of the Parliament Where let me tell yu by the way that the men who were employed in this weighty business whose names deserve to be continued in perpetual memory were Thomas Cranmer Arch-Bishop of Canterbury George Day Bishop of Chichester Thomas Goodrich B. of Ely and Lord Chancellour John Ship Bishop of Hereford Henry Holbeck Bishop of Lincoln Nicholas Ridley Bishop of Rochester translated afterwards to London Thomas Thirlby Bishop of Westminster Dr. May Dean of St. Pauls Dr. Taylor then Dean afterwards Bishop of Lincoln Dr. Hains Dean of Exeter Dr. Robertson afterwards Dean of Durham Dr. Redman Master of Trinity Colledge in Cambridge and Dr. Cox then Almoner to the King afterward Dean of Westminster and at last Bishop of Ely men famous in their generations and the honour of the Age they lived in And so much for the first Liturgy of King Edwards Reign in which you see how little was done by Authority or power of Parliament so little that if it had been less it had been just nothing But some exceptions being taken against the Liturgy by some of the preciser sort at home and by Calvin abroad the Book was brought under a review And though it had been framed at first if the Parliament which said so erred not by the ayd of the Holy Ghost himself yet to comply with
the curiosity of the Ministers and mistakes of the people rather than for any other weighty cause As the Statutes 5 and 6 Ed. 6. cap. 1. it was thought expedient by the King with the assent of the Lords and Commons in Parliament Assembled that the said Order of Common Service should be faithfully and godly perused explained and made fully perfect Perused and explained by whom Why questionless by those who made it or else by those if they were not the same men who were appointed by the King to draw up and compose a Form of Ordination for the Use of the Church And this Assent of theirs for it was no more was the only part that was ever acted by the Parliament in matter of this present nature save that a Statute passed in the former Parliament 3 and 4 Ed. 6. c. 12. unto this effect that such form and manner of making and consecrating Arch-Bishops Bishops Priests Deacons and other Ministers of the Church which before I spake of as by six Prelates and six other men of this Realm learned in Gods Laws by the King to be appointed and assigned shall be devised to that purpose and set forth under the great Seal shall be lawfully used and exercised and none other Where note that the King only was to nominate and appoint the men the Bishops and other learned men were to make the Book and that the Parliament in a blind obedience or at the least upon a charitable confidence in the integrity of the men so nominated did confirm that Book before any of their Members had ever seen it though afterwards indeed in the following Parliament this Book together with the Book of Common-prayer so Printed and explained obtained a more formal confirmation as to the use thereof throughout the Kingdom but in no other respect for which see the Statute 5 and 6 Ed. 6. c. 1. As for the time of Q. Elizabeth when the Common-prayer book now in use being the same almost with the last of King Edward was to be brought again into the Church from whence it was cast out in Queen Maries Reign it was committed to the care of some learned men that is to say to M. Whitehead once Chaplain to Q. Anne Bullen Dr. Parker after Arch-Bishop of Canterbury Dr. Grindal after Bishop of London Dr. Cox after Bishop of Ely Dr. Pilkington after Bishop of Durham Dr. May Dean of Saint Pauls Dr. Bill Provost of Eaton after Dean of Westminster and Sir Tho. Smith By whom being altered in some few passages which the Statute points to 1 Eliz. c. 21. it was presented to the Parliament and by the Parliament received and established without more ado or troubling any Committee of both or either Houses to consider of it for ought appears in their Records All that the Parliament did in it being to put it into the condition in which it stood before in Kings Edwards Reign partly by repealing the Repeal of King Edw. Statutes made in the first of Q. Mary c. 2. and partly by the adding of some farther penalties on such as did deprave the Book or neglect to use it or wilfully did absent themselves from their Parish-Churches And for the Alterations made in King James his time being small in the Rubrick only and for the additions of the Thanksgivings at the end of the Letany the Prayer for the Queen and the Royal Issue and the Doctrine of the Sacraments at the end of the Catechisme which were not in the Book before they were never referred unto the Parliament but were done only by Authority of the Kings Commission and stand in force by virtue only of His Proclamation which you may find before the Book the charge of buying the said Book so explained and altered being laid upon the several and respective Parishes by no other Authority than that of the eightieth Canon made in Convocation Anno 1603. The like may also be affirmed of the Forms of Prayer for the Inauguration-day of our Kings and Queens the Prayer-books for the fifth of November and the fifth of August and those which have been used in all publick Fasts All which without the help of Parliaments have been composed by the Bishops and imposed by the King Now unto this discourse of the Forms of Worship I shall subjoyn a word or two of the times of Worship that is to say the Holy-days observed in the Church of England and so observed that they do owe that observation chiefly to the Churches power For whereas it was found in the former times that the number of the Holy-days was grown so great that they became a burthen to the common people and a great hinderance to the thrift and manufactures of the Kingdom there was a Canon made in the Convocation An. 1536. For cutting off of many superstitious and superfluous Holy-days and the reducing them into the number in which they now stand save that St. George's day and Mary Magdalens day and all the Festivals of the blessed Virgin had their place amongst them according to which Canon there went out a Monitory from the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury to all the Suffragans of his Province respectively to see the same observed in their several Diocesses which is still extant on Record But being the Authority of the Church was then in the wane it was thought necessary to confirm their Acts and see execution done upon it by the Kings Injunction which did accordingly come forth with this Form or preamble That the abolishing of the said Holy-days was decreed ordained and established by the Kings Highness Authority as Supream Head in Earth of the Church of England with the common consent and assent of the Prelates and Clergy of this his Realm in Convocation lawfully Assembled and Congregate Of which see Fox his Acts and Monuments fol. 1246 1247. Afterwards in the year 1541. the King perceiving with what difficulty the people were induced to leave off those Holy-days to which they had been so long accustomed published his Proclamation of the twenty-third of July for the abolishing of such Holy-days amongst other things as were prohibited before by his Injunctions both built upon the same foundation namely the resolution of the Clergy in their Convocation And so it stood until the Reign of King E. 6. at which time the Reformation of the publick Liturgie drew after it by consequence an alteration in the present business no days being to be kept or accounted Holy but those for which the Church had set apart a peculiar office and not all those neither For whereas there are several and peculiar offices for the day of the Conversion of St. Paul and the day of St. Barnabas the Apostles neither of these are kept as Holy-days nor reckoned or esteemed as such in the Act of Parliament wherein the names and number of the Holy-days is precisely specified which makes some think the Act of Parliament to have had an over-ruling power on the Common-prayer-Book but it is not so
begin to intrench upon the Churches Rights to offer at and entertain such businesses as formerly were held peculiar to the Clergy only next to dispute their Charters and reverse their privileges and finally to impose some hard Laws upon them And of these notable incroachments Matthew Parker thus complains in the life of Cranmer Qua Ecclesiasticarum legum potestate abdicata populus in Parliamento coepit de rebus divinis inconsulto Clero Sancire tum absentis Cleri privilegia sensim detrahere juraque duriora quibus Clerus invitus teneretur Constituere But these were only tentamenta offers and undertakings only and no more than so Neither the Parliaments of K. Edward or Q. Elizabeths time knew what it was to make Committees for Religion or thought it fit that Vzzah should support the Ark though he saw it tottering That was a work belonging to the Levites only none of the other Tribes were to meddle with it But as the Puritan Faction grew more strong and active so they applyed themselves more openly to the Houses of Parliament but specially to the House of Commons putting all power into their hands as well in Ecclesiastical and Spiritual Causes as in matters Temporal This amongst others confidently affirmed by Mr. Pryn in the Epistle to his Book called Anti-Arminianism where he avers That all our Bishops our Ministers our Sacraments our Consecration our Articles of Religion our Homilies Common-prayer Book yea and all the Religion of the Church is no other way publickly received supported or established amongst us but by Acts of Parliament And this not only since the time of the Reformation but That Religion and Church affairs were determined ratified declared and ordered by Act of Parliament and no ways else even then when Popery and Church men had the greatest sway Which strange assertion falling from the pen of so great a Scribe was forthwith chearfully received amongst our Pharisees who hoped to have the highest places not only in the Synagogue but the Court of Sanhedrim advancing the Authority of Parliaments to so high a pitch that by degrees they fastened on them both an infallibility of judgment and an omniotency of power Nor can it be denied to deal truly with you but that they met with many apt Scholars in that House who either out of a desire to bring all the grist to their own Mill or willing to enlarge the great power of Parliaments by making new precedents for Posterity or out of faction or affection or what else you please began to put their Rules in practice and draw all matters whatsoever within the cognizance of that Court In which their embracements were at last so general and that humour in the House so prevalent that one being once demanded what they did amongst them returned this answer That they were making a new Creed Another being heard to say That he could not be quiet in his Conscience till the holy Text should be confirmed by an Act of theirs Which passages if they be not true and real as I have them from an honest hand I assure you they are bitter jests But this although indeed it be the sickness and disease of the present Times and little to the honour of the Court of Parliament can be no prejudice at all to the way and means of the Reformation amongst sober and discerning men the Doctrine of the Church being settled the Liturgy published and confirmed the Canons authorized and executed when no such humour was predominant nor no such power pretended to by both or either of the Houses of Parliament But here perhaps it will be said that we are fallen into Charybdis by avoiding Scylla and that endeavouring to stop the mouth of this Popish Calumny we have set open a wide gap to another no less scandalous of the Presbyterians who being as professed Enemies of the Kings as the Popes Supremacy and noting that strong influence which the King hath had in Ecclesiastical affairs since the first attempts for Reformation have charg'd it as reproachfully on the Church of England and the Religion here established that it is Regal at the best if not Parliamentarian and may be called a Regal Faith and a Regal Gospel But the Answer unto this is easie For first the Kings intended by the Objectors did not act much in order to the Reformation as appears by that which hath been said but either by the advice and co-operation of the whole Clergy of the Realm in their Convocations or by the Counsel and consent of the Bishops and most eminent Church men in particular Conferences which made it properly the work of the Clergy only the Kings no otherwise than as it was propouned by him or finally confirmed by the Civil Sanction And secondly had they done more in it than they did they had been warranted so to do by the Word of God who hath committed unto Kings and Sovereign Princes a Supreme or Supereminent power not only in all matters of a Temporal or Secular nature but in such as do concern Religion and the Church of Christ And so St. Augustine hath resolved it in his third Book against Cresconius In hoc Reges sicut iis divinitus praecipitur pray you note that well Deo serviunt in quantum Reges sunt si in suo Regno bona jubeant mala prohibeant non solum quae pertinent ad humanum societatem verum etiam ad Divinam Religionem Which words of his seemed so significant and convincing unto Hart the Jesuite that being shewed the Tractate writ by Dr. Nowel against Dorman the Priest in the beginning of Q. Elizabeths time and finding how the case was stated by that Reverend person he did ingenously confess that there was no Authority ascribed to the Kings of england in Ecclesiastical affairs but what was warranted unto them by that place of Augustine The like affimed by him that calleth himself Franciscus de S. Clara though a Jesuite too that you mjay see how much more candid and ingenuous the Jesuits are in this point than the Presbyterians in his Examen of the Articles of the Church of England But hereof you may give me opportunity to speak more hereafter when you propose the Doubts which you say you have relating to the King the Pope and the Churches Protestant and therefore I shall say no more of it at the present time SECT II. The manner of the Reformation of the Church of England declared and justified HItherto I had gone in order to your satisfaction and communicated my conceptions in writing to you when I received your Letter of the 4th of January in which you signified the high contentment I had given you in condescending to your weakness as you pleased to call it and freeing you from those doubts which lay heaviest on you And therewithal you did request me to give you leave to propound those other scruples which were yet behind relating to the King the Pope and the Protestant-Churches either too little
use of a Liturgy surther than to be an help in the want or to the weakness of a Minister and thereupon it is inferred with contempt enough that if any Minister appear insufficient to discharge the duty of conceived Prayer it may be imposed on him as a punishment to use set forms and no other If these two Propositions did proceed from the same one spirit as no doubt they did the extream falshood of the last doth prove sufficiently that neither of them did proceed from the Spirit of Truth King Edward VI. the Lord Protector then being and the learned Prelates of that time were our first Reformers the two first approving and confirming the last labouring and acting in that weighty business but all contributing to the passing of an Act of Parliament for uniformity of Service and Administration of the Sacraments 2 and 3. Ed. 6. cap. 1. and in that Act it is said expresly That all Ministers in any Cathedral or Parish Church or other place within this Realm of England Wales and other the Kings Dominions shall from and after the Feast of Pentecost next coming be bounden to say and use all Mattens Evensong Celebration of the Lords Supper commonly called the Mass and Administration of each of the Sacraments and their common and open Prayer in such order and form as is mentioned in the same Book and none other or otherwise Which clause continued still in being notwithstanding the alteration of the Liturgie till K. Edward's death and was revived again in the Act of Parliament 1 Eliz. cap. 2. By which the second Liturgie was confirmed and ratified Assuredly they that are bound to officiate by a Form prescribed to use no other Form but that and to use that Form no otherwise than the Law requireth and requireth under several penalties contained in it cannot be said to be at liberty to use or not to use it as they list themselves nor can pretend in any reason nor with common sense That the first Reformers of Religion did never intend the use of a Liturgy further than to be an help in the want or to the weakness of a Minister What the Reformers did in other Countreys was no Rule to ours who in the modelling of that great work had not only an eye and respect as the forementioned Statute telleth us to the most sincere and pure Christian Religion taught by the Scripture as probably the others had but also to the usages in the Primitive Church which certainly the others had not So that the second Position which the proud Inference thence deducted being blown aside the whole weight of the cause must wholly rest upon the first which whether it be of strength enough to support the same is the main disquisition and enquiry which we have in hand For when this Proposition was first vented and the point had been somewhat ventilated betwixt the humble Remonstrant on the one part and the Smectymnians on the other I was required by those who had Authority to command me to try what I could do in drawing down the Pedegree and the descent of Liturgies from the first use and institution of them amongst the Jews till they were setled and established also amongst the Christians For since the Smectymnians had appealed to the ancient practice of the Jews and Christians affirming positively that no such Liturgies that is to say no stinted and prescribed Forms of Administration were anciently used by either of them it is most fit and just they should be tryed by the Records and practice of those elder times to which they have Appealed for their justification So that the point between us being matter of Fact I shall pursue it in the way of an Historical Narration in which the Affirmative being made good by sufficient evidence it will be very difficult if not impossible to prove the Negative And for the better making good of the Affirmative I have taken in the Jewish Rabbins and other Antiquaries of that people of most faith and credit the holy Fathers and other Ecclesiastical Authors since the times of Christ to testifie unto the truth of what here is said either by way of explication of such Texts of Scripture which do relate unto this cause or in the way of declaration as laying down the practice of the Jews or Christians in their several times And that it may be seen that Liturgies or Set Forms of worship were of general usage I have made diligent search into the best and most unquestioned monuments of the ancient Gentiles and traced out many of their Forms of prayer and sacrifice used by them in the most religious acts of those performances and placed that search betwixt the practice of the Jews and that of the Christians And I have placed it in that order to the end that it may appear that the Christians had not only some ground of Scripture Tradition Apostolical and the best judgments of their own times to direct this business but that they were also guided in it by the light of Nature the Word of God amongst the Jews and the constant practice of that people in the times precedent Nor have I only took this pains in tracing out the constant practice of all people in respect of Liturgies but also with relation unto the necessary adjuncts and concomitants of them Set Forms of Worship require set times and places to perform them in which gives occasion to insert some notes or observations touching the Festivals or days of Religious offices taken up by the Authority of the Church in several Ages according as the commemoration of some signal benefits or Gods special mercies toward them might invite them to it The like I have done also in the erecting and dedicating of those sacred places which have been destinated in all times to Religious offices from the first Consecrating of the Tabernacle by Gods own appointment till the last dedication of the Temple in the time of Herod and from the first deputing of some places by the Lords Apostles for the divine performances and administrations of the Christian Faith till calmer times permitted the erecting of those stately Fabricks which the Gentiles looked upon with envy and admiration Some other things are intermingled touching the Habit of the Priests or Ministers under either Testament in the time or act of their officiating as also of the Gestures used both by Priests and People according to the several offices and acts of worship And this I have drawn down unto the time of S. Austin's death when neither Superstition in point of worship nor Heterodoxie in point of Doctrine had gotten any predominancy in the Church of Christ which was then come unto her height both for peace and purity By which the Reader may perceive how warrantably this Church proceeded in her Reformation as to this particular how strict an eye was had therein as well to the most sincere and pure Christian Religion taught by the Scripture as to the usages
Patriarch Jacob there being otherwise many places in his new gotten Kingdom of more convenience for his Subjects and less obnoxious to the Power of the Kings of Judah than this Bethel was The Act of Jacob in consecrating the Stone at Bethel gave the same hint to Jeroboam to profane the place by setting up his Golden Calves as Abrahams Grove gave to the Idolatrous Jews and Gentiles for polluting the like places with as impure abominations And probable enough it is that by these Acts of Abraham and Jacob the Macchabees proceeded to the Dedication of the Altar when profaned by Antiochus though they made use only of their own Authority in honouring that work and the celebration of it with an Annual Feast of which see Macc. 1. Chap. 4. v. 59 c. Which Feast being countenanced by our Saviour as is elsewhere said gave the first ground unto the Anniversary Feasts of Dedication used in the best and happiest times of Christianity De Eccles Officiis l. 1. c. 3. of which thus Isidore of Sivil Annuas Festivitates dedicationis Ecclesiarum ex more veterum celebrari in Evangelio legimus ubi dicitur facta sunt Encoenia c. Where we have both the custom and the reasons of it that is to say the antient practice of Gods people amongst the Jews occasionally mentioned and related too in the holy Gospel This being repeated and applyed we must next see by what Authority Gods people afterward proceeded on the like occasions Greater Authority we find for the Dedication of the Tabernacle than for the consecrating the Grove or Pillar which before we spake of even the command of God himself who though he had appointed it to be made prescribed as well the matter as the Form thereof descending even unto the nomination of the Workmen that were to take care of the Embroydery of it did not think fit it should be used in his publick Worship till it had first been dedicated to that end and purpose For thus saith God to Moses in the way of Precept And thou shalt take the anointing Oyl and anoint the Tabernacle and all that is therein and shalt hallow it and all the Vessels thereof and it shall be holy and thou shalt anoint the Altar of the Burnt-offering and all his Vessels and sanctifie the Altar Exod. 40.9 1. and it shall be an Altar most holy c. And thus did Moses in conformity to the Lords Commandment of whom it is affirmed Thus did Moses according to all that the Lord commanded him so did he That is to say he reared up the Tabernacle Verse 16 and disposed of every thing therein in its proper place hallowing the Tabernacle and the Altar and the Vessels of it as the Lord commanded and then and not till then was it thought fit for the Acts of Sacrifice and to be honoured with the presence of the Lord their God For as it followeth in that Chapter first Moses offered on the Altar so prepared and consecrated a Burnt-Offering and a Meat-Offering as the Lord commanded ver 29. And secondly A Cloud then covered the tent of the Congregation and the glory of the Lord filled the Tabernacle v. 34. No Fathers need be called in here to explain these Scriptures which every one can understand who is able to read them and every one who understandeth them may conclude from hence that God had never took such order for consecrating of the Tabernacle the Altars and other Vessels of it had he not meant to leave it for a Document and Example to succeeding times that no place should be used for his publick Worship till it was sanctified with Prayer and set apart by some Religious Ceremonies for that holy purpose According to which great Example we find a solemn dedication of the Temple when first built by Solomon performed by Prayer and Sacrifices in most solemn manner 1 Kings 8. A second Dedication of it when first restored by Zorobabel in the time of Ezra where it is said That the children of Israel Ezra 6.16 the Priests and the Levites and the rest of the children of the Captivity kept the Dedication of this House of God with joy And finally Josephus telleth us Antiq. Juda. l. 15. c. 14. that when Zorobabels Temple was pulled down by Herod and built again after a more magnificent manner than before it was with what alacrity and pomp the Jews did celebrate the Dedication of the same A Temple gloriously set out to the outward view immensae opulentiae Templum it is called by Tacitus as before was said and dedicated by the Founder with as great magnificence of which more hereafter Sufficient evidence to prove that whether the Temple be considered as a House of prayer or a place for Sacrifice it was not to be used for either not sanctified and set apart for those holy Actions Having thus seen what was done in those solemn Acts of Dedication by the Lords own people as well before as under the Law of Moses let us next see how far those Actions of Gods people have been followed by the antient Gentiles who though without the Law of Moses yet were instructed well enough by the light of Nature that Sacred Actions were not to be used in unhallowed places And here to go no further than the Roman story being the best compacted and most flourishing estate among the Gentiles we have in the first Infancy thereof a Temple dedicated by Romulus unto Jupiter Feretrius of which thus Livy Jupiter Feretri inquit Romulus haec tibi victor Rex Regia arma fero Templumque iis Regionibus quas meo animo metatus sum dedico sedem opimis spoliis quae Regibus Ducibusque hostium caesis me Autorem sequentes posteri ferent Unto which words of Romulus being the formal words of the Dedication Livy adds his own Hist Rom. Dec. 1. l. 1. Haec Templi est origo quod omnium primum Romae sacratum est That is to say this is the Original of that Temple which first of all was dedicated in the City of Rome Concerning which we are to know that Romulus having vanquished Tolumnius a poor neighbouring King in the head of his Army and brought his Armour into Rome in triumphant manner designed a Temple unto Jupiter from hence named Feretrius for the safe keeping and preserving of those glorious Spoils And having so designed the Temple thus bespeaks the gold viz. O Jupiter Feretrius I by this favour made a Conquerour do here present unto thee these Royal Arms and dedicate or design a Temple to thee in those Regions which in my mind I have marked out for that great purpose to be a seat for those rich Spoils which Posterity following my example having slain Kings or such as do command in chief shall present unto thee Which formal words did so appropriate that place to the service of Jupiter that afterwards it was not to be put unto other uses This done by Romulus
going a Journey this may be allowed of in case they permit not Mass and Prayers This I find extant as a Canon of the 6. General Council holden in Constantinople but since both this and all the rest of the same stamp there are nine in all are thought not to belong of right unto it I have chosen rather to rafer it to this Theodulphus though a private man amongst whose works I find it in the great Bibliotheca Patrum Tom. 9. Thus in a Synod held at Coy within the Realm and Diocess of Oviedo Anno 1050. it was decreed that all men should repair to Church on the Lords day and there hear Mattins Mass and other the canonical hours as also Opus servile non exerceant nec sectentur itinera that they should do no servile work Tit. 6. nor take any Journey Yet with exceptions four or five namely unless it were for Devotions sake or to bury the Dead or to visit the Sick or finally pro secreto regis Saracenorum impetu on special business of the Kings or to make head against the Saracens The King was much beholden to them that they would take such care of his State Affairs more than some Princes might be now in case their business were at the disposing of particular men So had it been decreed by several Emperours yea and by several Councils too which for the East pars was confirmed by Emanuel Comneus the Eastern Emperiour Anno 1174. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that all access to the Tribunal should be quite shut up that none of those who sat in Judgment should sit on any Cause that day Yet this not absolutely but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. unless the King shall please on any new emergent cause as many times business comes unlooked for to appoint it otherwise Thus also for the works of labour fishing had been resirained on the Lords day as toilsom Act and on he other Holy days as well as that yet did it please Pope Alexander the third he entred on the Chair of Rome Decretal l. 2. tit 9. c 3. Anno 1160. to order by his decretal that on the Lords day and the rest it might be lawful unto those who dwelt upon the Coast Si halecia terrae inclinarint eorum captioni ingruente necessitate intendere to set themselves unto their fishing in case the Herring came within their reach and the time was seasonable Provided that they sent a convenient portion unto the Churches round about them and unto the poor Nay even the works of Handicrafts were in some sort suffered For whereas in the Council of Laodicea it was determined that men should rest on the Lords day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from all their handy work and repair to Church Balsamon tells us in his Glass In Can. 29. concil Laod. that so it was resolved amongst them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not absolutely but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if with conveniency they could For still saith he he lived in Anno 1191 in case men labour on that day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 either because of want or any other necessity they are held excusable Lastly Chronic. Aditâ—i whereas Pope Gregory the ninth had on the Sundays and the Holy days commanded ut homines jumenta omnia quiescant that there should be a general restraint from labour both of man and beast there was a refervation also nisi urgens necessitas instet vel nisi pauperibus vel Ecclesiae gratis fiat unless on great necessity or some good Office to be done unto the poor or to the Church Nor were there reservations and exceptions only in point of business and nothing found in point of practice but there are many passages especially of the greatest persons and most publick actions left upon Record to let us know what liberty that assumed unto themselves as well on this day as the rest And in such only shall I instance and as being most exemplary and therefore most conducing to my present purpose Aventine Hist l. 3. And first we read of a great Battel fought on Palm-Sunday An. 718. between Charles Martel Grand master of the Houshold of the King of France and Hilpericus the King himself wherein the Victory fell to Charles and yet we read not there of any great necessity nay of none at all but that they might on both sides have deferred the Battel had they conceived it any sin to fight that day Upon the Sunday before Lent Anno 835. Ludovick the Emperour â—urnamed Pius or the godly together with his Prelates and others Baron which had been present with him at the Assembly held at Theonville went on his Journey unto Mets nor do we find that it did derogate at all from his Name and Piety Upon the Sunday after Whitsontide Anno 844. Ludowick Son unto Lotharius the Emperour made his solemn entrance into Rome the Roman Citizens attending him with their Flaggs and Ensigns the Pope and Clergy staying his coming in St. Peters Church there to entertain him Upon a Sunday Anno 1014. Ditmarus Hist l. 7. Otho Frising hist l. 6. c. 29. Henry the Emperour duodecim senatoribus vallatus environed with twelve of the Roman Senatours came to St. Peters Church and there was crowned together with his Wife by the Pope then being On Easter day in ipsa die paschalis solennitatis Anno 1027. Conrade the Emperour was solemnly inaugurated by Pope John Canutus King of England and Rodalph King of the Burgundians being then both present and the next Sunday after began his Journey towards Germany Upon Palm Sunday Anno 1084. Wibert Archbishop of Ravenna was solemnly inthronized in the Chair of Rome â—â—spergen Chronicon and the next Sunday after being Easter day Henry the third Imperiali dignitate sublimatus est was crowned Emperour On Passion Sunday Anno 1148. Lewis the King of France afterwards Canonized for a Saint made his first entry into Hierusalem with all his Army and yet we read not any where that it was laid in Bar against him to put by his Sainting as possibly it might be now were it yet to do What should I speak of Councils on this day assembled as that of Chartres Anno 1146. for the recovery of the Holy land of Tours on Trinity Sunday as we call it now Anno 1164. against Octavian the Pseudo-Pope that of Ferrara upon Passion Sunday Anno 1177. against Frederick the Emperour or that of Paris Anno 1226. summoned by Stephen then Bishop there on the fourth Sunday in Lent for the condemning of certain dangerous and erronious positions at that time on foot I have the rather instanced in these particulars partly because they hapned about these times when Prince and Prelate were most intent in laying more and more restraints upon their people for the more honour of this day and partly because being all of them publick actions and such as moved not forwards but by divers wheels they did require
a greater number of people to attend them And howsoever Councils in themselves be of an Ecclesiastical nature and that the crowning of a King in the act it self be mixed of sacred and of civil yet in the Train and great attendance that belongs unto them the Pomp the Triumphs and concourse of so many people they are meerly secular And secular although they were yet we may well persuade our selves that neither Actor or Spectator thought themselves guilty any wise of offering any the least wrong to the Lords day though those Solemnities no question might without any prejudice have been put off to another time No more did those who did attend the Princes before remembred in their magnificent Entries into Rome and Metz or the other military entrance into Hierusalem which were meer secular Acts and had not any the least mixture either of Ecclesiastical or Sacred Nature For Recreations in these times there is no question to be made but all were lawful to be used on the Lords day which were accounted lawful upon other days and had not been prohibited by Authority and we find none prohibited but dancing only Not that all kind of dancing was by Law restrained but either the abuse thereof at times unseasonable when men should have been present in the Church of God or else immodest shameless dancings such as were those against the which the Fathers did inveigh so sharply in the Primitive times In reference to the first Damascen tells us of some men who only wished for the LOrds day Parallellorum lib. 3. cap. 47. ut ab opera feriati vitiis operam dent that being quitted from their labours they might enjoy the better their sinful pleasures For look into the streets saith he upon other days and there is no man to be found die dominico egredere atque alios cithara canentes alios applaudentes saltantes c. But look abroad on the Lords day and you shall find some singing to the Harp others applauding of the Musick some Dancing others jeering of their Neighbours alios denique luctantes reperies and some also wrestling It followeth Praeco ad Ecclesiam vocat omnes segnitie torpent moras nectunt cithara aut tuba personuit omnes tanquam alis instructi currunt Doth the Clark call unto the Church they have a feaver-lurdane and they cannot stir doth the Harp of Trumpet call them to their Pastimes they fly as they had wings to help them They that can find in this a prohibition either of Musick Dancing publick sports or manlike Exercises such as wrestling is on the Lords day must certainly have better eyes than Lynceus and more wit than Oedipus Plainly they prove the contrary to what some alledg them and shew most clearly that the Recreations there remembred were allowed of publickly otherwise none durst use them as we see they did in the open streets Only the Father seems offended that they preferred their Pastimes before their Prayers that they made little or no haste to Church and ran upon the spur to their Recreations that where Gods publick Service was to be first considered in the Lords day and after on spare times mens private pleasures these had quite changed the course of Nature and loved the Lords day more for pleasure than for Devotion This is the most that can be made from this place of Damascen and this makes more for dancing and such Recreations than it doth against them in case they be not used at unfitting hours Much of this nature is the Canon produced by some to condemn dancing on the Lords day as unlawful utterly which being looked into condemns alone immodest and unseemly dancings such as no Canon could allow of upon any day of what name soever A Canon made by Pope Eugenius in a Synod held at Rome Anno 826. what time both Prince and Prelates did agree together to raise the Lords day to as high a pitch as they fairly might Now in this Synod there were made three Canons which concern this day the first prohibitive of business and the works of labour the second against process in causes criminal the third ne núlieres festis diebus vanis ludis vacent that Women do not give themselves on the Holy days unto wanton sports and is as followeth Sunt quidam maxime mulieres qui festis sacris diebus c. Certain there are but chiefly Women which on the Holy days Can. 35. and Festivals of the blessed Martyrs upon the which they ought to rest have no great list to come to Church as they ought to do sed balando turpia verba decantando c. but to spend the time in Dancing and in shameless Songs leading and holding cut their Dances as the Pagans used and in that manners come to the Congregation These if they come unto the Church with few sins about them return back with more and therefore are to be admonished by the Parish Priest that they must only come to Church to say their prayers such as do otherwise destroying not themselves alone but their Neighbours also Now in this Canon there are these three things to be considered First that these Women used not to come unto the Church with that sobriety and gravity which was fitting as they ought to do but dancing singing sporting as the Pagans used when they repaired unto their Temples secondly that these dancings were accompanied with immodest Songs and therefore as unfit for any day as they were for Sunday and thirdly that these kind of dancings were not prohibited on the Lords day only but on all the Holy days Such also was the Canon of the third Council of Tolledo Decret pars 3. de consecrat distinct 3. An. 589. which afterwards became a part of the Canon Law though by he oversight of the Collector it is there said to be the fourth and this will make as little to the purpose as the other did It is this that followeth Irreligiosa consuetudo est quam vulgus per sanctorum solennitates festivitates agere consuevit Populi qui divina officia debent attendere saltationibus turpibus invigilant cantica non solum mala canentes sed etiam religiosorum officiis perstrepunt Hoc enim ut ab omni Hispania the Decret reads ab omnibus provinciis depellatur sacerdotum ac judicum à sancto Concilio curae commit titur There is an irreligious custom taken up by the common people that on the Festivals of the Saints those which should be attent on Divine Service give themselves wholly to lascivious and shameless dances and do not only sing unseemly Songs but disturb the Service of the Church Which mischief that it may be soon removed out of all the Countrey the Council leave it to the care of the Priests and Judges Such dances and employed to so bad a purpose there is none could tolerate and yet this generally was upon the Holy days Saints days I mean as well
as well upon the Saturday as upon the Sunday it is now time we turned our course and set sail for England where we shall find as little of it as in other places until that forty years ago no more some men began to introduce a Sabbath thereunto in hope thereby to countenance and advance their other projects CHAP. VII In what estate the Lords day stood in this Isle of Brittain from the first Planting of Religion to the Reformation 1. What doth occur about the Lords day and the other Festivals amongst the Churches of the Brittains 2. Of the estate of the Lords day and the other Holy-days in the Saxon Heptarchy 3. The honours done unto the Sunday and the other Holy-days by the Saxon Monarchs 4. Of the publick actions Civil Ecclesiastical mixt and Military done on the Lords day under the first six Norman Kings 5. New Sabbath Doctrins broached in England in King Johns Reign and the miraculous original of the same 6. The prosecution of the former story and ill success therein of the undertakers 7. Restraint of worldly business on the Lords day and the other Holy-days admitted in those times in Scotland 8. Restraint of certain servile works on Sundays Holy-days and the Wakes concluded in the Council of Oxon under Henry III. 9. Husbandry and Legal process prohibited on the Lords day first in the Reign of Edward III. 10. Selling of Wools on the Lords day and the solemn Feasts forbidden first by the said King Edward as after Fairs and Markets generally by King Henry VI. 11. The Cordwainers of London restrained from selling their Wares on the Lords day and some other Festivals by King Edward IV. and the repealing of that Act by King Henry VIII 12. In what estate the Lords day stood both for the doctrine and the practice in the beginning of the Reign of the said King Henry AND now at last we are for England that we may see what hath been done amongst our selves in this particular and thereby be the better lessoned what we are to do For as before I noted the Canons of particular Churches and Edicts of particular Princes though they sufficiently declare both what their practice and opinion was in the present point yet are no general rule nor prescript to others which lived not in the compass of their Authority Nor can they further bind us as was then observed than as they have been since admitted into our Church or State either by adding them unto the body of our Canon or imitating them in the composition of our Acts and Statutes Only the Decretals of the Popes the body of their Canon Law is to be excepted which being made for the direction and reiglement of the Church in general were by degrees admitted and obeyed in these parts of Christendome and are by Act of Parliament so far still in force as they oppose not the Prerogative Royal or the municipal Laws and Statutes of this Realm of England Now that we may the better see how it hath been adjudged of here and what hath been decreed ordome touching the Lords day and the other Holy-days we will ascend as high as possibly we can even to the Church and Empire of the Brittains Of them indeed we find not much and that delivered in as little it being said of them by Beda Hist l. 1. c. 8. that in the time of Constantine they did dies festos celebrare observe those Holy-days which were then in use which as before we said were Easter Whitsontide the Feasts of Christs Nativity and his Incarnation every year together with the Lords day weekly And yet it may be thought that in those times the Lords day was not here of any great account in that they kept the Feast of Easter after the fashion of the Churches in the Eastern parts decima quarta luna on what day of the week soever which certainly they had not done had the Lords day obtained amongst them that esteem which generally it had found in the Western Churches And howsoever a late writer of Ecclesiastical History endeavour to acquit the Brittains of these first Ages from the erroneous observation of that Feast Brought hist l. 4. c. 13. and make them therein followers of the Church of Rome yet I conceive not that his proofs come home to make good his purpose For where it is his purpose to prove by computation that that erroneous observation came not in amongst the Brittains till 30 years before the entrance of S. Austin and his associates into this Island and for that end hath brought a passage out of Beda touching the continuance of that custom It 's plain that Beda speaks not of the Brittish but the Scottish Christians Permansit autem apud eos the Scottish-Irish Christians as himself confesseth hujusmodi observantia Paschalis tempore non pauco hoc est usque ad annum Domini 717. per annos 150. which was as he computes it somewhat near the point but 30 years before the entrance of that Austin Now for the Scots it is apparent that they received not the faith till the year of Christ 430 not to say any thing of the time wherein they first set footing in this Island which was not very long before and probably might about that time of which Beda speaks receive the custom of keeping Easter from the Brittains who were next neighbours to them and a long time lived mingled with them But for the Brittains it is most certain that they had longer been accustomed to that observation though for the time thereof whether it came in with the first plantation of the Gospel here we will not contend as not pertaining to the business which we have in hand Suffice it that the Brittains anciently were observant of those publick Festivals which had been generally entertained in the Church of God though for the time of celebrating the Feast of Easter they might adhere more unto one Church than unto another As for the Canon of the Council of Nice Anno 198. which is there alledged Baronius rightly hath observed out of Athanasius that notwithstaning both the Canon and the Emperours Edicts thereupon tamen etiam postea Syros Cilices Mesopotamios in eodem errore permansisse the Syrians Cilicians and Mesopotamians continued in their former errours And why not then the Brittains which lay farther off as well as those that dwelt so near the then Regal City Proceed we next unto the Saxons who as they first received the faith from the Church of Rome so did they therewithal receive such institutions as were at that time generally entertained in the Roman Church the celebration of the Lords day and the other Festivals which were allowed of and observed when Gregory the Great attained the Popedom And here to take things as they lie in order we must begin with a narration concerning Westminster which for the prettiness of the story I will here insert Sebert the first Christian King of the East Saxons
themselves to prayer and Gods publick service Particularly Fitz-Herbert tells us that no plea shall be holden Quindena Paschae Nat. Brevium fol. 17. 1 Eli◠p. 168. because it is always on the sunday but it shall be holden crastino quindenae paschae on the morrow after So Justice Dyer hath resolved that if a Writ of scire facias out of the Common-pleas bear Test on a Sunday it is an errour because that day is not dies juridicus in Banco And so it is agreed amongst them that on a Fine levied with Proclamations according to the Statute of King Henry VII if any of the Proclamations be made on the Lords day all of them are to be accounted erroneous Acts. But to return unto the Canon where before we left however that Archbishop Langton formerly and Islip at the present time had made these several restraints from all servile labours yet they were far enough from entertaining any Jewish fancy The Canon last remembred that of Simon Islip doth express as much But more particularly and punctually we may find what was the judgment of these times in a full declaration of the same in a Synod at Lambeth what time John Peckham was Archbishop which was in Anno 1280. Lindw l. 1. tit de offic Archipresb It was thus determined Sciendum est quod obligatio ad feriandum in Sabbato legali expiravit omnino c. It is to be understood that all manner of obligation of resting on the legal Sabbath as was required in the Old Testament is utterly expired with the other ceremonies And it is now sufficient in the New Testament to attend Gods service upon the Lords days and the other Holy days ad hoc Ecclesiastica authoritate deputatis appointed by the Church to that end and purpose The manner of sanctifying all which days non est sumendus à superstitione Judaica sed à Canonicis institutis is not to be derived from any Jewish superstition but from the Canons of the Church This was exact and plain enough and this was constantly the doctrine of the Church of England Joannes de Burgo who lived about the end of K. Henry VI. doth almost word for word resolve it so in his Pupilla oculi part 10. c. 11. D. Yet find we not in these restraints that Marketting had been forbidden either on the Lords day or the other Holy days and indeed it was not that came in afterwards by degrees partly by Statutes of the Realm partly by Canons of the Church not till all Nations else had long laid them down For in the 28 of King Edward III. cap 14. it was accorded and established that shewing of Wools shall be made at the Stapie every day of the week except the Sunday and the solemn Feasts in the year This was the first restraint in this kind with us here in England and this gives no more priviledge to the Lords day than the solemn Festivals Antiq. Brit. in Stafford Nor was there more done in it for almost an hundred years not till the time of Henry VI. Anno 1444. what time Archbishop Stafford decreed throughout his Province ut nundina emporia in Ecclesiis aut Coemiteriis diebusque Dominicis atque Festis praeterquam tempore messis non teneantur that Fairs and Markets should no more be kept in Churches and Church-yards or on the Lords days or the other Holy-days except in time of Harvest only If in that time they might be suffered then certainly in themselves they were not unlawful on any other further than as prohibited by the higher powers Now that which the Archbishop had decreed throughout his Province Tabians Chronicle Catworth Lord Mayor of London attempted to exceed within that City For in this year saith Fabian Anno 1444. an Act was made by Authority of the Common Council of London that upon the Sunday should no manner of thing within the franchise of the City be bought or sold neither Victual nor other thing nor no Artificer should bring his Ware unto any man to be worn or occupied that day as Taylers Garments and Cordwayners Shooes and so likewise all other occupations But then it followeth in the story the which Ordinance held but a while enough to shew by the success how ill it doth agree with a Lord Mayor to deal in things about the Sabbath Afterwards in the year 1451. which was the 28 of this Henries Reign it pleased the King in Parliament to ratifie what before was ordered by that Archbishop in this form that followeth 28. H. 6. c. 16. Considering the abominable injuries and effences done to Almigvty God and to his Saints always ayders and finguler affistants in our necessities by the necasion of Fairs and Marhets upon their high and principal Feasts as in the Feast of the Ascension of our Lord. in the day of Corpus Christi in the day of Whitsunday Trinity Sunday and other Sundays as also in the high Feast of the Assumption of our Blessed Lady the day of all Saints and on Good Friday accustomably and miserably holden and used in the Keaim of England c. our Soveraign Lord the King c. hath ordained that all manner of Fairs and Markets on the said principal Feasts and Sundays and Good Friday shall clearly cease from all shewing of any Goods and Merchandises necessary Victual only ercept which yet was more than was allowed in the city-City-Act upon pain of forfeiture of all the goods aforesaid to the Lord of the franchise or liverty where such goods be or shall be she wed contrary to this Ordinance the four Sundays in Harvest except Which clause or reservation sheweth plainly that the things before prohibited were not esteemed unlawful in themselves as also that this Law was made in confirmation of the former order of the Archbishop as before was said Now on this Law I find two resolutions made by my Lords the Judges First Justice Brian in the 12th of King Edward the fourth declared that no sale made upon a Sunday though in a Fair or Market-overt for Markets as it seemeth were not then quite laid down though by Law prohibited shall be a good sale to alter the property of the goods And Ploydon in the time of Queen Elizabeth was of opinion Daltons Justice cap. 27. that the Lord of any Fair or Market kept upon the Sunday contrary to the Statute may therefore be indicted for the King or Queen either at the Assizes or general Goal delivery or Quarter Sessions within that County If so in case such Lord may be Endicted for any Fair or Market kept upon the sunday as being contrary to the Statute then by the same reason may he be Endicted for any Fair or Market kept on any of the other Holy-days in that Statute mentioned Nor staid it here For in the 1465. which was the fourth year of King Edward IV. it pleased the King in Parliament to Enact as followeth Our Soveraign Lord the
Archbishop Cranmer Bishop Ridley Bishop Hooper c. 9. The Doctrine delivered in the Book of Articles touching the five controverted points 10. An answer to the Objection against these Articles for the supposed want of Authority in the making of them 11. An Objection against King Edwards Catechism mistaken for an Objection against the Articles refelled as that Catechism by John Philpot Martyr and of the delegating of some powers by that Convocation to a choice Committee 12. The Articles not drawn up in comprehensive or ambiguous terms to please all parties but to be understood in the respective literal and Grammatical sense and the Reasons why I Have the longer stood upon the answering of this Objection to satisfie and prevent all others of the like condition in case it should be found on a further search that any of our godly Martyrs or learned Writers who either suffered death before the Reign of Edward VI. or had no hand in the carrying on of the Reformation embraced any opinions in Doctrine or Discipline contrary to the established Rules of the Church of England For otherwise as we must admit all Tyndals Heterodoxies and Friths high flying conceits of Predestination which before we touch'd at so must we also allow a Parity or an Identity rather in Priests and Bishops because John Lambert another of our Godly Martyrs did conceive so of it In the primitive Church saith he there were no more Officers in the Church of God than Bishops and Deacons that is to say Ministers as witnesseth beside Scripture S. Hierom in his Commentaries on the Epistles of S. Paul Whereas saith he that those whom we now call Priests were all one and no other but Bishops and the Bishops no other but Priests men ancient both in age and learning so near as could be chosen nor were they instituted and chosen as they be now a days the Bishop and his Officer only opposing them whether they can construe a Collect but they were chosen also with the consent of the people amongst whom they were to have their living as sheweth S. Cyprian But alack for pity such elections are banished and new fashions brought in By which opinion if it might have served or a Rule to the Reformation our Bishops must have been reduced to the rank of Priests and the right of Presentation put into the hands of the people to the Destruction of all the Patrons in the Kingdom If then the question should be asked as perhaps it may On whom or on whose judgment the hrst Reformers most relied in the weighty business I answer negatively First That they had no respect of Calvin no more than to the judgement of Wicklef Tyndal Barns or Frith whose offered assistance they refused when they went about it of which he sensibly complained unto some of his friends as appears by one of his Epistles I answer next affirmatively in the words of an Act of Parliament 2. 3. Edw. 6. where it is said That they had an eye in the first place to the more pure and sincere Christian Religion taught in the Scriptures and in the next place to the usages of the Primitive Church Being satisfied in both which ways they had thirdly a more particular respect to the Lutheran Plat-forms the English Confession or Book of Articles being taken in many places word for word out of that of Ausberg and a conformity maintained with the Lutheran Churches in Rites and Ceremonies as namely in kneeling at the Communion the Cross in Baptism the retaining of all the ancient Festivals the reading of the Epistles and Gospels on Sundays and Holy-days and generally in the whole Form of External Worship Fourthy in reference to the points disputed they ascribed much to the Authority of Melancthon not undeservedly called the Phoenix of Germany whose assistance they earnestly desired whose coming over they expected who was as graciously invited hither by King Edward the Sixth Regiis literis in Angliam vocari as himself affirms in an Epistle to Camerarius His coming laid aside upon the fall of the Duke of Sommerset and therefore since they could not have his company they made use of his writings for their direction in such points of Doctrine in which they though it necessary for the Church to declare her judgment I observe finally That as they attributed much to the particulars to the Authority of Melancthon so they ascribe no less therein unto that of Erasmus once Reader of the Greek Tongue in Cambridge and afterwards one of the Professors of Divinity there whose Paraphrases on the four Evangelists being translated into English were ordered to be kept in Churches for the use of the People and that they owned the Epistles to be studied by all such as had cure of souls Concerning which it was commanded by the injunctions of King Edward VI. published by the advice of the Lord Protector Somerset and the Privy Council Acts and Mon. fol. 1181. in the first year of the said Kings Reign 1. That they should see provided in some most convenient and open place of every Church one great Bible in English with the Paraphrase of Erasmus in English that the People might reverently without any let read and hear the same at such time as they listed and not to be inhibited therefrom by the Parson or Curate but rather to be the more encouraged and provoked thereunto And 2. That every Priest under the degree of a Batchellour of Divinity should have of his own one New Testament in English and Latine with the Paraphrases of Erasmus upon the same and should diligently read and study thereupon and should collect and keep in memory all such comfortable places of the Scripture as do set forth the Mercy Benefits and Goodness of Almighty God towards all penitent and believing persons that they might thereby comfort their flock in all danger of death despair or trouble of Conscience and that therefore every Bishop in their Institution should from time to time try and examine them how they have profited in their studies A course and care not likely to have entred into the thoughts of the Lord Protector or any of the Lords of the Council if it had not been advised by some of the Bishops who then began to have an eye on the Reformation which soon after followed and as unlikely to be counselled and advised by them had they intended to advance any other Doctrine than what was countenanced in the Writings of that Learned man Whereupon I conclude the Doctrine of the points disputed to be the true and genuine Doctrine of the Church of England which comes most near to the plain sense of holy Scripture the general current of the Fathers in the Primitive times the famous Augustane Confession the Writings of Melancthon and the Works of Erasmus To which Conclusion I shall stand till I find my self encountred by some stronger Argument to remove me from it The ground thus laid I shall proceed unto the Reformation
was then so generally received and taught in the Reformed Church of England as not to be known to Artificers Tradesmen and Mechanicks and that they were so well instructed in the niceties of it as to believe that though Christ died effectually for all yet the benefit thereof should be effectually applied to none but those who do effectually repent Fourthly I consider that if the Popish Clergy of those times did believe no otherwise of Predestination than that men be elected in respect of good works and so long elected as they do them and no longer as Carelese hath reported of them the Doctrine of the Church hath been somewhat altered since those times there being now no such Doctrine taught in the Schools of Rome as that a man continues no longer in the state of Election than whilst he is exercised in good works And finally I consider the unfortunate estate of those who living under no certain rule of Doctrine or Discipline lie open to the practices of cunning and malicious men by whom they are many times drawn aside from the true Religion For witnesses whereof we have Trew and Carelese above mentioned the one being wrought on by the Papists the other endangered by the Gospellers or Zuinglian Sectaries For that Carelese had been tampered with by the Gospellers or Zuinglian Sectaries doth appear most clearly first by the confidence which he had of his own salvation and of the final perseverance of all others also which are the chosen members of the Church of Christ and secondly but more especially for giving the scornful title of a Free-will man to one of his fellow Prisoners who was it seems of different persuasion from him For which consult his Letter to Henry Adlington in the Act. and Mon. Fol. 1749. which happened unto him as to many others when that Doctrine of the Church wanted the countenance of Law and the Doctors of the Church here scattered and dispersed abroad not being able to assist them In which condition the affairs of the holy Church remained till the beginning of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth and for some years after But no sooner had that gracious Lady attained the Crown when she took order for the reviewing of the publick Liturgy formerly Authorized by Act of Parliament in the fifth and sixth years of King Edward VI. The men appointed for which work were Dr. Parker after Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. Grindal after Bishop of London Dr. Pilkington after Bishop of Durham Dr. Cox after Bishop of Elie Dr. May Dean of Pauls Dr. Bill Provost of Eaton after Dean of Westminster Mr. Whitehead sometimes Chaplain to Queen Anne Bullen designed to be the first Archbishp of this new Plantation and finally Sir Thomas Smith a man of great esteem with King Edw. VI. and the Queen now Reigning By thesE men was the Liturgy reviewed approved and passed without any sensible alteration in any of the Rubricks Prayers and Contents thereof but only the giving of some contentment to the Papists and all moderate Protestants in two particulars the first whereof was the taking away of a clause in the Letany in which the People had been taught to pray to Almighty God to deliver them from the tyranny of the Bishop of Rome and all his detestable enormities The second was the adding of the sentences in the distribution of the Sacrament viz. The Body of our Lord Jesus which was given for thee preserve thy body and soul to everlasting life The Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ which was shed for thee c. which sentences exclusive of the now following words of participation as they were only in the first so were they totally left out of the second Liturgy of King Edward VI. Other alterations I find none mentioned in the Act of Parliament 1 Eliz. c. 2. but the appointing of certain Lessons for every Sunday in the year which made no change at all in the publick Doctrine before contained in that book and that the People might be the better trained up in the same Religion which had been taught and preacht unto them in the time of King Edward VI. She gave command by her Injunctions published in the first year of her Reign Ann. 1559. that the Paraphrases of Erasmus should be diligently studied both by Priest and People And to that end it was required as formerly in the Injunctions of the said King Edward 1. That the Paraphrases of the said Erasmus Injunct 6. and on the Gospel in the English tongue should be provided at the joynt charges of the Parson and Parishioners and being so provided should be set up in some convenient place of every Church so as the Parishioners may most commodiously resort unto the same and read the same out of the time of common service And secondly Injunct 16. that every Parson Vicar Curate and Stipendary Priest shall provide and have of his own within the time therein limitted the New Testament in Latine and English with the Paraphrases on the same conferring the one with the other And the Bishops by themselves and other Ordinaries and their Officers in Synods and Visitations shall examine the said Ecclesiastical Priests how they have profited in the study of holy Scripture Evident Arguments that there was no intent of setling any other Doctrine in the Church of England than such as was agreeable to the Judgment of that Learned man The next care was for making and perfecting those Homilies of which we find mention at the end of King Edwards book for the necessary edifying of Christian People and the increase of godly living both books sufficiently provided for besides the confirmation of that first Article of the year 1552. in the Rubrick of the second Liturgy where it is said that after the Creed if there be no Sermon shall follow one of the Homilies already set forth or to be set forth by common authority which Rubrick being revised with the rest of the Liturgy put the said books of Homilies as well the second as first part of them into the service of the Church and thereby made them no small part of the publick doctrine But who they were which laboured in this second book whether they were the same that drew up the first or those who in Queen Elizabeths time reviewed the Liturgy or whether they were made by the one and reviewed by the other I have no where found though I have taken no small pains in the search thereof But those few doctrinals which were contained in the Book of Common Prayer or deducible from it not being much taken notice of and the Homilies not confirm'd by that common Authority which was required in the Rubrick the Zuinglians or Gospellers took the opportunity to disperse their doctrines before the door of utterance should be shut against them or any publick course be taken to suppress their practices And this they did with so much diligence and cunning that they encreased exceedingly both in power and numbers of
Kings than of the Thief that steals thy goods or the Adulterer that defiles thy marriage-bed or the Murderer that seeks thy life all which are reckoned for Gods curses in the holy Scripture The point we purpose to make proof of goeth not down so easily that is to say That in the vilest men and most unworthy of all honour if they be once advanced to the publick Government there doth reside that excellent and divine Authority which God hath given in holy Scripture to those who are the Ministers of his heavenly Justice who therefore are to be reverenced by the Subject for as much as doth concern them in the way of their publick duties with as much honour and obedience as they would reverence the best King were he given unto them And first the Reader must take notice of the especial Act and Providence of Almighty God SECT 26. not without cause so oft remembred in the Scriptures in disposing Kingdoms Dan. 2 21 37. and segging up such Kings as to him seems best The Lord saith Danicl changeth the times and the seasons he removeth Kings and setteth up Kings And in another place That the living may know that the most High ruleth in the Kingdoms of men and giveth them to whomsoever he will Which kind of sentences as they are very frequent in the Scriptures so is that Prophesie most plentiful and abundant in them No man is ignorant that Nebuchadnezzar who destroyed Hierusalem was a great spoiler and oppressor yet the Lord tells us by Ezechicl that he had given unto him the land of Egypt for the good service he had done in laying it waste on his Commandment Dan. 2.37 And Daniel said unto him thus Thou O King art a King of Kings for the God of Heaven hath given thee a Kingdom power and strength and glory And wheresoever the children of men dwell the beasts of the field and the fowls of heaven hath he given into thy hand and hath made thee Ruler over them all Again to Belshazzer his son Dan. 5.18 The most high God gave unto Nebuchadnezzar thy father a Kingdom and majesty and glory and honour and for the majesty that he gave him all people nations and languages trembled and feared before him Now when we hear that Kings are placed over us by God let us be pleased to call to mind those several precepts to fear and honour them which God hath given us in his Book holding the vilest Tyrant in as high account as God hath graciously vouchsafed to estate him in When Samuel told the people of the house of Israel what they should suffer from their King 1 Sam. 8.11 he expressed it thus This will be the manner of the King which shall reign over you he will take your sons and appoint them for himself for his Chariots and to be his Horsemen and some shall run before his Chariots And he will appoint him Captains over thousands and Captains over fifties and will set them to ear his ground and to reap his harvest and to make his instruments of War and instruments of his Chariots And he will take your daughters to be his Confectionaries and to be Cooks and to be Bakers And he will take your fields and your Vineyards and your Olive-yards even the best of them and give them to his servants And he will take the tenth of your seed and of your Vineyards and give to his Officers and to his Servants And he will take your men-servants and your maid-servants and your goodliest young men and your Asses and put them to his work He will take the tenth of your sheep and ye shall be his Servants Assuredly their Kings could not do this lawfully whom God had otherwise instructed in the Book of the Law but it is therefore called Jus Regis the right of Kings upon the Subject which of necessity the Subjects were to submit unto and not to make the least resistance As if the Prophet had thus said So far shall the licentiousness of your Kings extend it self which you shall have no power to restrain or remedy to whom there shall be nothing left but to receive the intimation of their pleasures and fulfil the same But most remarkable is that place in the Prophet Jeremy SECT 27. which though it be somewhat of the longest I will here put down because it doth so plainly state the present question Jer. 27. â— I have made the earth saith the Lord the man and the beast that are upon the ground by my great power and by my out-stretched Arm and have given it unto whom it seemed meet unto me And now have I given all these Lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon my Servant and the Beasts of the field have I given him also to serve him and all Nations shall serve him and his Son and his Sons Son until the very time of his Land come and it shall come to pass that the Nation and Kingdom which will not serve the same Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon and that will not put their neck under the yoke of the King of Babylon that Nation will I punish saith the Lord with the sword and with the famine and with the pestilence wherefore serve the King of Babylong and live We see by this how great a measure of obedience was required by God towards that fierce and cruel Tyrant only because he was advanced to the Kingly Throne and did by consequence participate of that Regal Majesty which is not to be violated without grievous sin Let us therefore have this always in our mind and before our eyes that by the same decree of God on which the power of Kings is constituted the very wickedest Princes are established and let not such seditious thoughts be admitted by us that is to say that we must deal with Kings no otherwise than they do deserve and that it is no right nor reason that we should shew our selves obedient subjects unto him who doth not mutually perform the duty of a King to us It is a poor objection which some men have made viz. that that command was only proper to the Israelites for mark upon what grounds the command was given SECT 28. I have given saith the the Kingdom unto Nebuchadnezzar wherefore serve him and ye shall live and thereupon it needs must follow that upon whomsoever God bestows a Kingdom to him we must address our service and that assoon as God hath raised any to the Regal Throne he doth sufficiently declare his will to be that he would have that man to reign over us Some general testimonies of this truth are in holy Scripture For thus saith solomon For the transgression of a Land many are the Princes thereof Prov. 24.2 and job He looseth the band of Kings and girdeth their loins with a girdly Job 12.18 Which if confessed there is no remedy at all but we must serve those Kings if we mean to
that they were instituted in a time when the affairs of State were managed by nine Annual Magistrates all of them chosen by the people and accomptable to them Livie hist lib. 2. In all these cases cum non in regno populus esset sed in libertate when the people had sued out their Wardship and thought themselves to be at liberty freed from those bonds which Nature and Allegiance formerly had laid upon them they did no more than what a wise and understanding people had good cause to do in taking the best course they could for their future safety And in my mind the people pleade most unanswerably in their own behalf when they alledged se foris pro imperio libertate dimicantes Id. ibid. domi à civibus captos oppressos that fighting valiantly abroad both for their own liberty and their Countreys honour against their Kings they were oppressed and wronged at home by their fellow-Citizens that their condition as things stood was better in times of War than in times of peace their liberty never more assured than when they were amongst their Enemies and therefore being no otherwise bound to submit themselves to that change of Government than as it had been introduced by their own consent they had all the reason in the World to get as good terms as they could and be no losers by the bargain Which though it were the case and plea particularly of the people of Rome might be used also very fitly by the Spartans and Athenians on the self-same reasons But this can no way be pretended or alledged by those who live in an established and successional Monarchy where there is one only to command in chief and nothing left to the Subject praeter obsequii gloriam Tacit. Annal. but the glory of obedience only and the necessity of submiting with a Loyal heart to those commands and impositions which may be laid upon them with an unjust hand So that admitting it for true as indeed it is not the Ephori the Demarchi and the Tribunes were ordained for the ends supposed yet it can follow by no rules of Law or Logick that because such popular Officers have been sometimes instituted to keep the scale upright and the balance even betwixt the Nobles and the People in an Aristocratie therefore the like are to be fancied in a setled Monarchy for moderating the licentiousness that is to say for that no doubt must be his meaning for regulating the Authority of the Sovereign Prince Thus have we seen a manifest discovery of Calvins purpose for setting up some popular Officers in every Kingdom to regulate the Authority and restrain the power of Sovereign Princes and we may see a secret and more subtle danger included in that short Parenthesis than what is obvious at first sight to the unwary Reader For by the instances proposed and presented to us it seems to be his meaning that those popular Officers should not have powr only to restrain their Kings when they trangress the bounds of Law or Equity and either Tyranically oppress the Subject or wilfully dilapidate the Patrimony of the Common-wealth but that they should set themselves against them and controul their doings in the same way and after the same manner as the Ephori did the Kings of Sparta or the Tribunes did the Roman Consuls Now we have shewn before out of several Authors Vide Chap. 1. that the Ephori did not only take upon them to appoint such Privy Counsellors about their Kings as to them seemed best to limit and prescribe them in the choice of their Wives to send them out unto the Wars and recall them home as if they had been hirelings only and of no more reckoning to put them upon Fine and Ransom if they did any thing which was not pleasing to these humorous Gentlemen to have them at command both to come and go at often as they whistled for them or held up a Finger and finally to look for lowly reverence from them whensoever they vouchsafed to summon them to attend their pleasures but also to imprison next to banish and in fine to murder them And we have shewed you of the Tribunes that after they had fortified themselves with large priviledges and grew predominant in the affections of the common people Vide Chap. 2. they did not only quarrel and oppose the Consuls under pretence of setting forth new Laws for the peoples benefit nor were content to ut the people into the possession of all the Offices and honours of the Common-wealth which formerly belonged to the Nobles only whether the Consuls would or not but sometimes clap'd them up in Prison and sometimes forced them to fly the Senate-house for their lives and safety and sometimes threw them down headlong out of their Chairs of State to the great danger of their lives and disgrace of their persons Princes should be in worse condition than their meanest Subjects if they were under the command of such powerful masters who being exalted from mean fortunes and ignoble Families little acquainted with good manners and less with any thing which is brave and Rohal would think themselves unworthy of so great an Office should they not Lord it to the purpose and exercise all kind of Tyranny on their captived Kings which insolence and malice could suggest unto them If Jack be once in Office he must be a Gentleman and gallop to the Devil if he get on Horseback Juvenal Sat. Asperius nihil est humili cum surgit in altum as the Poet hath it If once the Bramble come to have Dominion over the trees of the forrest he will not only rob the Olive of his fatness the Vine of his rich Wines and the Fig-tree of his sweetness but also will devour the Cedars even the Cedars of Lebanon Judg. c. 9. No King or other Supream Magistrate shall dare to stand before them or if he do a fire shall come out of the Bramble and consume him utterly Such popular Officers as those of whom Calvin speaks are of such credit and Authority with the common people whose Officers they are in name but in fact their Masters that if they do but blow the Trumpet and say We have no part in David nor no inheritance at all in the son of Jesse 2 Sam. 20. every man will unto his Tents and forsake the King or Supream Magistrate to follow after them though men of Belial And this I do believe the rather to be Calvins meaning because G. Buchannan who built on his foundation and pursued his Principles doth not only exceedingly commend the act of Theopompus in setting up the Ephori in the State of Sparta and the Answer which he made his Wife when she murmured at it but thinks it very meet and reasonable that a free people as all Subjects are in his opinion should be armed with the like Authority in reprimenda tyrannidis acerbitate De jure regni
negandum as if it were not fit to deny them any thing Calvin in Jerem. c. 38. ver 5. Not so saith he it rather is amarulenta Regis querimonia a sad and bitter complaint of the poor captivated King against his Counsellors by whom he was so over-ruled ut velit nolit cedere iis cogitur that he was forced to yield to them whether he would or not which he expresly calls inexcusabilem arrogantiam an intolerable piece of sawciness in those Princes and an exclusion of the King from his legal Rights Let us next take a view of such Christian Kingdoms as are under the command of absolute Monarchs And first we will begin with the Realm of France the Government whereof is meerly Regal if not despotical such as that of a Master over his Servants which Aristotle defineth to be a Form of Government 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wherein the King may do whatsoever he list Aristot Politic. l. 3. according to the counsel of his own mind For in his Arbitrary Edicts which he sendeth abroad he never mentioneth the cosent of the People or the approbation of the Council or the advice of his Judges which might be thought to derogate too much from his absolute power but concludes all of them in this Regal Form Car tel est nostre plaisir for such is our pleasure And though the Court of Parliament in Paris do use to take upon them to peruse his Edicts View of France by Dallington before they pass abroad for Laws and sometime to demur on his Grants and Patents and to petition him to reverse the same as they see occasion yet their perusal is a matter but of meer formality and their demurs more dilatory than effectual It is the Car tel est nostre plaisir that concludes the business and the Kings pleasure is the Law which that Court is ruled by As for the Assemblie des Estats or Conventus Ordinum it was reputed anciently the Supream Court for Government and Justice of all the Kingdom and had the cognizance of the greatest and most weighty affairs of State But these meetings have been long since discontinued and almost forgotten there being no such Assembly from the time of King Charles the eighth to the beginning of the reign of King Charles the ninth Thuanus hist sui temp which was 70 years and not many since And to say truth they could be but of little use as the World now goeth were the meetings oftner For whereas there are three Principal if not sole occasions of calling this Assembly or Conventus Ordinum that is to say the disposing of the Regency during the nonage or sickness of the King the granting Aids and Subsidies and the redress of the grievances there is now another course taken to dispatch their business The Parliament of Paris which speaks most commonly as it is prompted by power and greatness appointeth the Regent Contin Thuani An. 1610. View of France the Kings themselves together with their Treasurers and Under-Officers determine of the Taxes and they that do complain of Grievances may either have recourse to the Courts of Justice or else petition to the King for redress thereof And for the making new Laws or repealing the old the naturalization of the Alien and the regulating of his Sales or Grants of the Crown-Lands the publick patrimony of the Kingdom which were wont to be the proper Subject and debates of these Grand Assemblies they also have been so disposed of that Conventus Ordinum is neither troubled with them nor called about them The Chamber of Accompts in Paris which hath some resemblance to our Court of Exchequer doth absolutely dispose of Naturalizations Andr. Du Chesn and superficially surveyeth the Kings Grants and Sales which they seldom cross The Kings Car tel est nostre plaisir is the Subjects Law and is as binding as any Act or Ordinance of the three Estates and for repealing of such Laws as upon long experience are conceived to be unprofitable the Kings sole Edict is as powerful as any Act of Parliament Of which Bodinus doth not only say in these general terms Bodin de Rep. lib. 1. cap. 8. Saepe vidimus sine Ordinum convocatione consensu leges à Principe abrogatas that many times these Kings did abrogate some ancient Laws without the calling and consent of the three Estates but saith that it was neither new nor strange that they should so do and gives us some particular instances not only of the later times but the former Ages Nay when the power of this Assemblie des Estats was most great and eminent neither so curtailed nor neglected as it hath been lately yet then they carried themselves with the greatest reverence and respect before their King that could be possibly imagined For in the Assembly held at Tours under Charles the 8. though the King was then no more than 14 years of age and the Authority of that Court so great and awful that it was never at so high an eminence for power and reputation quanta illis temporibus as it was at that time yet when they came before the King Monsieur de Rell being then Speaker for the Commons or the third Estate did in the name of all the rest and with as much humility and reverence as he could devise promise such duty and obedience such a conformity of his will and pleasure such readiness to supply his wants and such alacrity in hearking unto his Commandments that as Bodinus well observes his whole Oration was nothing else quam perpetua voluntatis omnium erga Regem testificatio but a constant testimony and expression of the good affections of the Subject to their Lord and Sovereign Id. ibid. But whatsoever power they had in former times is not now material King Lewis the thirteenth having on good reason of State discharged those Conventions for the time ensuing Instead whereof he instituted an Assembly of another temper and such as should be more obnoxious to his will and pleasure consisting of a certain number of persons out of each Estate but all of his own nomination and appointment which join'd with certain of his Council and principal Officers he caused to be called L' Assembly des Notables assigning to them all the power and privileges which the later Conventions of the three Estates did pretend unto right well assured that men so nominated and intrusted would never use their powers to his detriment and disturbance of his heirs successors But to proceed Bodinus having shewn what dutiful respects the Convention of Estates in France shewed unto their King adds this Note nec aliter Hispanorum conventus habentur that the Assembly of the three Estates in the Realms of Spain carry themselves with the like reverence and submission to their Lord the King Nay major etiam obedientia majus obsequium Regi exhibetur the King of Spain hath more obedience and observance
from his three Estates than that which is afforded to the Kings of France Id. ibid. which being but general and comparative is yet enough to let us see that the Assembly of Estates in the Realms of Spain which they call the Curia is very observant of their King and obsequious to him and have but little of that power which is supposed by our Author to be inherent in the three Estates of all the Christian Kingdoms But this Bodinus proveth more particularly ascribing to the King and to him alone the power of calling this Assembly when he sees occasion and of dissolving it again when his work is done according as is used both in France and England And when they are assembled and met together their Acts and Consultations are of no effect further than as they are confirmed by the Kings consent Which he declareth in the same Form eadem formulâ quâ apud nos that hath accustomably been used by the Kings of France which is authoritative enough that is to say decernimus statuimus volumus We will and we appoint and we have decreed The Kings of Spain Id. ibid. p. 90. though not so despotical in their Government as the French Kings are are as absolute Monarchs and have as great an influence on the three Estates to make them pliant to their will and to work out their own ends by them as ever had the French Kings on their Courts of Parliament a touch whereof we had before in the former Chapter And this we may yet further see by their observance of the pleasure of King Philip the 2d Who having maried the Lady Elizabeth Daughter of Henry the 2d of France Convocatos Castellae reliquarum Hispaniae Provinciarum Ordines calling together the Estates of Castile and his other Provinces of Spain Thuan. hist sui temp l. 23. he caused them to swear to the succession of his Son Prince Charles whom he had by the Lady Mary of Portugal and after having on some jealousies of State put that Prince to death caused them to swear to the succession of another Son by the Lady of Austria And for the power of his Edicts which they call Pragmaticas they are as binding to the Subject as an Act of Parliament or any kind of Law whatever Examples of the which are very obvious and familiar in the Spanish Histories For though there be a body of Laws in use amongst them partly made up of some old Gothish Laws and Constitutions and partly of some parts of the Law imperial yet for the explanation of the Laws in force if any doubt arise about them or for supplying such defects which in the best collection of the Laws may occur sometimes the Magistrates and Judges are to have recourse to the King alone and to conform to such instructions as he gives them in it And this is it which was ordained by Alfonso the tenth qui etiam magistratus ad judices Principem adire jussit quoties patrio jure nihil de proposita causa seriptum esset as Bodinus hath it Bodin de Rep. lib. 1. cap. 8. 'T is true that for the railing of supplies of money and the imposing of extraordinary Taxes upon the Subject the Kings of Spain must be beholden to the three Estates without whose consent it cannot legally be done But then it is as true withal Id. ibid. p. 90. that there are customary Tributes called Servitia which the King raiseth of his own Aurhority without such consent And their consenting to the extraordinary is a thing of course the Spanish Nation being so well affected naturally to the power and greatness of their Kings whom they desire to make considerable if not formidable in the opinion of their Neighbours that the Kings seldom fail of moneys if the Subjects have it Finally that we may perceive how absolute this Monarch is over all the Courts or Curias of his whole Dominions take this along according as it stands verbatim in the Spanish History Spanish Hist 67. by Iyrannel The King of Spain as he is a potent Prince and Lord of many Countreys so hath he many Councils for the managing of their affairs distinctly and apart without any confusion every Council treating only of those matters which concern their Jurisdiction and charges with which Councils and with the Presidents thereof being men of chief note the King doth usually confer touching matters belonging to the good Government preservation and increase of his Estates and having heard every mans Opinion he commands that to be executed which he holds most fit and convenient Next let us take a view of Scotland and we shall find it there no otherwise I mean in reference to the point which is now in question than in France or Spain For besides that Bodinus makes it one of those absolute Monarchies ubi Keges sine controversia omnia jura Majestatis habent per sese Bodin de Repub l. 2. c. 7. Cambden in Britan. descript in which the Kings have clearly all the Rights of Majesty inherent in their own persons only it is declared in the Records of that very Kingdom that the King is directus totius Dominus the Sovereign Lord of the whole State and hath all authority and jurisdiction over all Estates and degrees as well Ecclesiaestical as Lay or Temporal And as for those Estates and Degrees convened in Parliament we may conjecture at their Power by that which is delivered of the Form or Order which they held it in Form of holding the Parl. in Scotland which is briefly this As soon as the Kings Writ is issued out for summoning the Estates to meet in Parliament he maketh choice of eight of the Spiritual Lords such on whose wisdom and integrity he may most rely which eight do chuse as many of the Temporal Lords and they together nominate eight more out of the Commissioners for the Counties and as many out of the Commissioners for the Towns or Burroughs These 32 thus chosen are called Domini pro Articulis Lords of the Articles and they together with the Chancellor Treasurer Keeper of the Privy Seal and principal Secretaries of State and the Master of the Rolls whom they call Clerk Register do admit or reject every Bill but not before they have been shewn unto the King if they pass there they are presented afterwards to the whole Assembly where being throughly weighed and examined and put unto the Votes of the House such of them as are carried by the major part of the Voices for the Lords and Commons sit together in the same House there are on the last day of the Sessions exhibited to the King who by touching them with his Scepter pronounceth that he either ratifieth and approveth them or that he doth disable them and make them void But if the business be disliked by the Lords of the Articles it proceeds no further and never comes unto the consideration of the Parliament
sometimes to pass by a Statute with a non obstante as in the Statute 1 Hen. IV. cap. VI. touching the value to be specified of such Lands Offices or Annuities c. as by the King are granted in his Letters patents But these will better come within the compas of those jura Majestatis Cambden in Brit. or rights of Sovereignty which our Lawyers call sacra individua Sacred by reason they are not to be pried into with irreverent eyes and individual or inseparable because they cannot be communicated unto any other Of which kind are the levying of Arms Case of our Affairs p. suppressing of tumults and rebellions providing for the present safety of his Kingdom against sudden dangers convoking of Parliaments and dissolving them making of Peers granting liberty of sending Burgesses to Towns and Cities treating with forein States making War Leagues and Peace granting safe conduct and protection Indenizing giving of Honour Rewarding Pardoning Coyning Printing and the like to these But what need these particulars have been looked into to prove the absoluteness and sovereignty of the Kings of England when the whole body of the Realm hath affirmed the same and solemnly declared it in their Acts of Parliament 16 Rich. 2. c. 5. In one of which is affirmed that the Crown of England hath been so free at all times that it hath been in no earthly subjection but immediatly to God in all things touching the regality of the said Crown and to none other And in another Act that the Realm of England is an Empire governed by one Supream Head and King having the Dignity and Royal Estate of the Imperial Crown of the same unto whom a Body politick compact of all sorts and degrees of people divided in terms and by names of Spiritualty and Temporalty be bounden and ought to bear next to God a natural and bumble obedience 24 Hen. 8. c. 12. And more than so That the King being the supream Head of this Body Politick is instituted and furnished by the goodness and sufferance of Almighty God with plenary whole and entire power preheminence authority prerogative and jurisdiction to render and yield justice and final determination to all manner of Subjects within this Realm and in all causes whatsoever Nor was this any new Opinion invented only to comply with the Princes humour but such as is declared to have been fortified by sundry Laws and Ordinances made in former Parliaments Ibid. and such as hath been since confirmed by a solemn Oath taken and to be taken by most of the Subjects of this Kingdom Which Oath consisting of two parts the one Declaratory and the other Promissory in the Declaratory part the man thus taketh it he doth declare and testifie in his conscience that the Kings Highness is the only supream Governour of this Realm and of all other his Dominions and Countries as well in all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or causes as temporal c. And in the Promissory part 1 Eliz. c. 1. they make Oath and swear that to their power they will assist and defend all Jurisdictions Priviledges Preheminencies and Authorities granted or belonging to the Kings Highness his Heirs and Successors or united and annexed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm Put all which hath been said together and it will appear that if to have merum imperium a full and absolute command and all the jura majestatis which belong to Sovereignty if to be so Supream as to hold immediatly of God to have all persons under him none but God above him if to have all authority and jurisdiction to be vested in him and proceeding from him and the material sword at his sole disposal for the correcting of offenders and the well ordering of his people if to have whole and entire power of rendring justice and final determination of all causes to all manner of Subjects as also to interpret and dispence with Laws and all this ratified and confirmed unto him by the solemn Oath of his Subjects in the Court of Parliament be enough to make an absolute Monarch the Kings of England are more absolute Monarchs than either of their Neighbours of France or Spain If any thing may be said to detract from this it is the new device so much pressed of late of placing the chief Sovereignty or some part thereof in the two Houses of Parliament concerning which Mr. Pryn published a discourse entituled The supreme power of Parliaments and Kingdoms and others in their Pamphlets upon that Argument have made the Parliament so absolute and the King so limited that of the two the Members of the Houses are the greater Monarchs But this is but a new device not heard of in our former Monuments and Records of Law nor proved or to be proved indeed by any other Medium than the Rebellions of Cade Tiler Straw Kett Mackerel Prynns book of Parl. c. pt 3. and the rest of that rascal rabble or the seditious Parliaments in the time of King Henry III. King Edward II. and King Richard II. when civil war and faction carried all before it For neither have the Houses or either of them enjoyed such Sovereignty de facto in times well setled and Parliaments lawfully assembled nor ever could pretend to the same de jure Or if they do as many have been apt enough to raise false pretences it would much trouble them to determine whether this Sovereignty be conferred upon them by the King or the People whether it be in either of the Houses severally or in both united If they can challenge this pretended Sovereignty in neither of these capacities nor by none of these titles it may be warrantably concluded that there is no such Sovereignty as they do pretend to And first there is no part nor branch of Sovereignty conferred upon them by the King The Writs of Summons which the Deelaration of the Lords and Commons assembled at Oxon. 1643. doth most truly call the foundation of all power in Parliament Declaration of the Trtaty p. 15. tell us no such matter The Writ directed to the Lords doth enable them only to confer and treat with one another consilium vestrum impendere and to advise the King in such weighty matters as concern the safety of the Kingdom But they are only to advise not compel the King to counsel him but not controll him and to advise and counsel are no marks of Sovereignty but rather works of service and subordination Nor can they come to give this Counsel without he invite them and being invited by his Writ cannot choose but come except he excuse them which are sure notes of duty and subjection but verry sorry signs of power and sovereignty 'T is true that being come together they may and sometimes do on a Writ of Error examin and reverse or affirm such judgments as have been given in the Kings Bench and from their sentence in the case there is
way of a Petition to the Kings most excellent Majesty in which the Lords and Commons do most humbly pray as their Rights and Liberties that no such things as they complained of might be done hereafter that his Majesty would vouchsafe to declare that the Awards doings and proceedings to the prejudice of his people in any of the premises shall not be drawn hereafter into consequence or example and that he would be pleased to declare his Royal pleasure that in the point aforesaid all his Offieers and Ministers should serve him according to the Laws and Statutes of this Realm To which although the King returned a fair general Answer assuring them that his Subjects should have no cause for the time to come to complain of any wrong or oppressions contrary to their just Rights and Liberties yet this gave little fatisfaction till he came in person and causing the Petition to be distinctly read by the Clerk of the Crown Ibid. returned his Answer in these words Soit droit fait come est desire that is to say let right be done as is desired Which being the very formal words by which the said Petition and every clause and Article therein contained became to be a Law and to have the force of an Act of Parliament and being there is nothing spoken of the concurrent Authority of the Lords and Commons for the enacting of the same may serve instead of many Arguments for the proof of this that the Legislative power as we phrase it now is wholly and solely in the King although restrained in the exercise and use thereof by constant custom Smith de Rep. Angl. unto the counsel and consent of the Lords and Commons Le Roy veult or the King will have it so is the imperative phrase by which the Propositions of the Lords and Commons are made Acts of Parliament And let the Lords and Commons agitate and propound what Laws they please for their ease and benefit as generally all Laws and Statutes are more for the ease and benefit of the Subject than the advantage of the King yet as well now as formerly in the times of the Roman Emperors Quod Principi placuerit legis habet vigorem nothing but that which the King pleaseth to allow of is to pass for Law the Laws not taking their coercive force as judicious Hooker well observeth from the quality of such as devise them but from the Power which giveth them the strength of Laws Pooker Ecclesiast Pol. I shut up this Discourse with this expression and comparison of a late Learned Gentleman viz That as in a Copyhold Estate the Copyholder of a meer Tenant at will comes by custom to gain an Inheritance and so to limit and restrain the will and power of the Lord that he cannot make any determination of the Copyholders Estate otherwise than according to the custom of the Mannour and yet doth not deprive the Lord of his Lordship in the Copyhold nor participate with him in it neither yet devest the Fee and Franktenement out of the Lord Case of our Affairs p. 6. but that they still remain in him and are ever parcel of his Demesn so in the restraining of the Kings Legislative power to the concurrence of the Peers and Commons though the custom of the Kingdom hath so fixed and setled the restraint as that the King cannot in that point use his Sovereign power without the concurrence of the Peers and Commons according to the custom of the Kingdom yet still the Sovereignty and with it the inseparable Legislative power doth reside solely in the King If any hereupon demand to what end serve Parliaments and what benefit can redound to the Subject by them I say in the Apostles words much every way Rom. 3.2 Many vexations oftentimes do befall the Subjects without the knowledg of the King and against his will to which his Ears are open in a time of Parliament The King at other times useth the Eyes and Ears of such as have place about him who may perhaps be guilty of the wrongs which are done the people but in a Parliament he seeth with his own Eyes and heareth with his own Ears and so is in a better way to redress the mischief than he could be otherwise Nor do the people by the opportunity of these Parliamentary meetings obtain upon their Prayers and Petitions a redress of grievances only but many times the King is overcome by their importunity to abate so much of his Power to grant such points and pass such Laws and Statutes for their ease and benefit as otherwise he would not yield to For certainly it is as true in making our approaches and Petitions to our Lord the King as in the pouring out of our Prayers and supplications to the Lord our God the more multitudinous and united the Petitioners are the more like to speed And therefore said Bodinus truly Principem plaeraque universis concedere quae singulis denegarentur Bodin de Rep. l. 1. c. 8. that Kings do many times grant those favours to the whole body of their people which would be absolutely denied or not so readily yielded to particular persons There are moreover many things of greater concernment besides the abrogating of old Laws and making new which having been formerly recommended by the Kings of England to the care and counsel of their people convened in Parliament are not now regularly dispatched but in such Conventions as are altering the Tenure of Lands confirming the Rights Titles and possessions of private men naturalizing Aliens legitimating Bastards adding sometimes the secular Authority to such points of Doctrine and Forms of Worship as the Clergy have agreed upon in their Convocations if it be required changing the publick weights and measures throughout the Kingdom defining of such doubtful cases as are not easily resolved in the Courts of Law raising of Subsidies and Taxes attainting such as either are too potent to be caught or too hard to be found and so not triable in the ordinary Courts of Justice restoring to their Bloud and Honours such or the Heirs of such as have been formerly attainted granting of free and general Pardons with divers others of this nature In all and each of these the Lords and Commons do co-operate to the publick good Sir Tho. Smith de Rep. Angl. Cambden in Brit. Crompt of Courts c. in the way of means and preparation but their co operation would be lost and fruitless did not the King by his Concomitant or subsequent grace produce their good intentions into perfect Acts and being Acts either of special Grace and Favour or else of ordinary Right and Justice no way derogatory to the Prerogative Royal are usually confirmed by the Royal assent without stop or hesitancy But then some other things there are of great importance and advantage to the Common-wealth in which the Houses usually do proceed even to final sentence the Commons in the way of
things are commanded to all men both Priests and Monks and not to temporal men only which he declareth in the beginning when he said Let every soul be subject to the highest powers although thou be an Apostle although thou be an Evangelist although thou be a Prophet although thou be whatsoever thou art Which said he gives this reason for it That Religion is not overthrown by this subjection If no Apostle could pretend to an exemption from those common duties which Subjects owe unto their Princes then certainly the Pope who pretends to sit in Peters Chair and to challenge all the priviledges which belonged unto him must needs be in as great subjection to a Christian Emperor as the Apostles were in their times to any Heathen King If those things were required of Priests and Monks as he says they were then must the Papal Clergy whether they be Monastick or secular Priests perform those duties and yield that due obedience unto those Kings and Princes under whom they live which are here required But so it is that partly by strong hand and partly by taking their opportunities in the darker Ages of the Church the Pope hath not only freed his Clergy from the power of Princes in matters even of Civil nature and concernment but challengeth for himself a power above them and exercised it for a long time with great pride and Tyranny contrary to the Apostles Rule and the Fathers Commentary If to Evangelist or Prophet could challenge any such exemption as the Father plainly saith they could not then much less can the Presbyterian Minister pretend unto it though he be both a Prophet and an Evangelist also in his own conceit Which notwithstanding the Scotish Presbyterians had got unto so great a head in the minority of King James in all matters which related to Ecclesiastical congnizance and to that cognizance they reduced all matters they commonly declin d the Kings judgment and his Courts of Judicature as altogether incompetent appealing from them either to their own Presbyteries or to the next general Assembly of their own appointing and standing so wilfully to those Appeals that some of them had like to have paid dear for it after that Kings coming into England if the King had not been more merciful to them than that they deserved at his hands If no man whatsoever he be can lawfully acquit himself from this subjection as is said by Chrysostom what will become of Calvins popular Magistrates and of the great Authority which he gives them over Kings and Princes those popular Officers being included equally with the rest of the people in St. Pauls injunction It s true that Calvins popular Officers may seem to have some colour for it both from our English Translation and the vulgar Latin by which obedience is required sublimioribus potestatibus to the higher powers and all such popular Officers whatsoever they be may warrantably be lookt upon as higher powers in respect of the residue of the people But first the words in the Original viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do not so properly signifie the higher as the supream powers and so the word is rendâ—ed in the first of S. Peter cap. 1. ver 13. in which submission is required to every Ordinance of man for the Lords sake whether it be unto the King 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as to the Supream or unto such as are sent by him c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. Peter in the singular 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. Paul in the plural number both words proceeding from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Nominative Case and consequently being of the same sense and signification But secondly permitting them the benefit of these Translations yet will they find but little colour for that coercive power that Sovereign Authority and Jurisdiction which Calvin hath assigned to the three Estates or any other popular Officers over Kings and Princes For though such popular Officers may warrantably be lookt upon as higher powers in respect of the residue of the people as before was said yet are they lower powers in respect of the King from whom as they receive all the Authority which they have whatsoever it be so unto him they are to render an accompt of their actings in it whensoever he pleaseth So that these popular Officers may be compar'd not unntly unto the Genera subalterna in the Schools of Logick each of them being subordinate to one another the Constable to the Mayor or Bayliff in a Corporate Town or to the Justices of the Peace in the County at large the Mayors and Justices to the Judges in their several Circuits the Judges in their several Circuits and their Courts of Judicature to the Lord Chancellor for the time being and he unto the three Estates when convened in Parliament till they end all in genus summum in that supream power which is subordinate to none and unto which the rest are Species subalternae as the Logicians phrase it in their several Orders till they end all in Specie infimâ even in the lowest of the People Less comfort can I give them from the Apostle of the Jews from the words of St. Peter in which submission is required as before was said to every ordinance of man whether it be unto the King as unto the Supream or unto Governors as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evil doers and for the praise of them that do well Now those which are thus authorised and sent by Kings to the ends and purposes before mentioned may very properly be resembled unto Jehosophats Commissioners in the Kingdom of Judah or the itinerary Judges in the Realm of England 2 Chron. 17.7 and can neither claim nor exercise any other Authority than what in their Commissions and instructions is assigned unto them And certainly no King did or will ever grant any such Commission whereby his Under-officers and Inferior Magistrates may challenge any power above him or exercise any jurisdiction or Authority over him If any thing in this Text may be thought to favour Calvin in this strange opinion it is that Kings are said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 humana creatura saith the vulgar Latin an Ordinance of Man as the English read it and being but a Creature of the Peoples making the rest may think themselves as good men as he The Rhemists will have Kings to be called humane Creatures because Elected by the people or holding their Sovereignty by birth and carnal propagation ordained for the wealth peace and prosperity of the Subjects to put a difference betwixt that humane Superiority and the spiritual Rulers and Regiments guiding and governing the people to an higher end and instituted by God himself immediately Christ having expresly constituted the form of Regiment used ever since in the Church Whereunto Dr. Fulk for want of a better doth return this Answer viz. That though there be great difference between the government of
Page 477 6. The prosecution of the former story and ill success therein of the undertakers ibid. 7. Restraint of worldly business on the Lords day and the other Holy-days admitted in those times in Scotland Page 478 8. Restraint of certain servile works on Sundays Holy-days and the Wakes concluded in the Council of Oxon under Henry III. ibid. 9. Husbandry and Legal process prohibited on the Lords day first in the Reign of Edward III. Page 479 10. Selling of Wools on the Lords day and the solemn Feasts forbidden first by the said King Edward as after Fairs and Markets generally by King Henry VI. Page 480 11. The Cordwainers of London restrained from selling their Wares on the Lords day and some other Festivals by King Edward IV. and the repealing of that Act by King Henry VIII Page 481 12. In what estate the Lords day stood both for the doctrine and the practice in the beginning of the Reign of the said King Henry ibid. CHAP. VIII The story of the Lords day from the Reformation of Religion in this Kingdom till this present time 1. The doctrine of the Sabbath and the Lords day delivered by three several Martyrs conformably to the judgment of the Protestants before remembred Page 483 2. The Lords day and the other Holy-days confessed by all this Kingdom in the Court of Parliament to have no other ground than the Authority of the Church Page 484 3. The meaning and occasion of that clause in the Common-Prayer-book Lord have mercy upon us c. repeated at the end of the fourth Commandment Page 485 4. That by the Queens Injunctions and the first Parliament of her Reign the Lords day was not meant for a Sabbath day Page 486 5. The doctrine in the Homilies delivered about the Lords day and the Sabbath ibid. 6. The sum and substance of that Homily and that it makes not any thing for a Lords day Sabbath Page 487 7. The first original of the New Sabbath Speculations in this Church of England by whom and for what cause invented Page 489 8. Strange and most monstrous Paradoxes preached on occasion of the former doctrines and of the other effects thereof Page 490 9. What care was taken of the Lords day in King James his Reign the spreading of the doctrines and of the Articles of Ireland Page 491 10. The Jewish Sabbath set on foot and of King James his Declaration about Lawful sports on the Lords day Page 493 11. What Tracts were writ and published in that Princes time in opposition to the doctrines before remembred ibid. 12. In what estate the Lords day and the other Holy-days have stood in Scotland since the Reformation of Religion in that Kingdom Page 494 13. Statutes about the Lords day made by our present Sovereign and the misconstruing of the same His Majesty reviveth and enlargeth the Declaration of King James Page 496 14. An exortation to obedience unto his Majesties most Christian purpose concludes this History Page 497 Historia Quinqu-Articularis Or a Declaration of the Judgment of the Western Churches and more particularly of the Church of England in the five Controverted Points c. CHAP. I. The several Heresies of those who make God to be the Author of Sin or attribute too much to the Natural freedom of Man's Will in the Works of Piety 1. God affirmed by Florinus to be the Author of sin the Blasphemy encountred by Irenaeus and the foul Consequents thereof Page 505 2. Revived in the last Ages by the Libertines said by the Papists to proceed from the Schools of Calvin and by the Calvinists to proceed from the Schools of Rome Page 506 3. Disguised by the Maniches in another dress and the necessity thereby imposed on the Wills of men ibid. 4. The like by Bardesanes and the Priscilianists the dangerous consequents thereof exemplified out of Homer and the words of St. Augustine Page 507 5. The Error of the Maniches touching the servitude of the Will revived by Luther and continued by the rigid Lutherans ibid. 6. As those of Bardesanes and Priscilian by that of Calvin touching the Absolute Decree the dangers which lie hidden under the Decree and the incompatibleness thereof with Christs coming to Judgment ibid. 7. The large expressions of the Ancient Fathers touching the freedom of the Will abused by Pelagius and his followers Page 508 8. The Heresie of Pelagius in what it did consist especially as to this particular and the dangers of it ibid. 9. The Pelagian Heresie condemned and recalled the temper of S. Augustine touching the freedom of the Will in spiritual matters ibid. 10. Pelagianism falsly charged on the Moderate Lutherans How far all parties do agree about the freedom of the Will and in what they differ Page 509 CHAP. II. Of the Debates amongst the Divines in the Council of Trent touching Predestination and Original Sin 1. The Articles drawn from the Writings of the Zuinglians touching Predestination and Reprobation Page 510 2. The Doctrine of Predestination according to the Dominican way ibid. 3. As also the old Franciscans with Reasons for their own and against the other Page 511 4. The Historians judgment interposed between the Parties ibid. 5. The middle way of Catarinus to compose the differences ibid. 6. The newness of St. Augustines Opinion and the dislike thereof by the most Learned men in the Ages following Page 512 7. The perplexities amongst the Theologues touching the absoluteness of the Decrees ibid. 8. The judgment of the said Divines touching the possibility of falling from Grace ibid. 9. The Debates about the nature and transmitting of Original Sin ibid. 10. The Doctrine of the Council in it Page 513 CHAP. III. The like Debates about Free-will with the Conclusions of the Council in the five Controverted Points 1. The Articles against the Freedom of the Will extracted out of Luther's Writings Page 314 2. The exclamation of the Divines against Luther's Doctrine in the Point and the absurdities thereof ibid. 3. The several judgments of Marinarus Catarinus and Andreas Vega ibid. 4. The different judgment of the Dominicans and Franciscans whether it lay in mans power to believe or not to believe and whether the freedom of the Will were lost in Adam ibid. 5. As also of the Point of the co-operation of mans Will with the Grace of God Page 515 6. The opinion of Frier Catanca in the point of irresistibility ibid. 7. Faintly maintained by Soto a Dominican Fryer and more cordially approved by others but in time rejected ibid. 8. The great care taken by the Legates in having the Articles so framed as to please all parties Page 516 9. The Doctrine of the Council in the five Controverted Points ibid. 10. A Transition from the Council of Trent to the Protestant and Reformed Churches Page 517 CHAP. IV. The judgment of the Lutherans and Calvinians in these five Points with some Objections made against the Conclusions of the Council of Dort 1. No difference in Five Points betwixt the
no appeal but only to the whole body of that Court the King Case of our Assairs p. 7 8. and both the Houses the Head and Members But this they do not as the upper House of Parliament but as the distinct Court of the Kings Barons of Parliament of a particular and ministerial jurisdiction to some intents and purposes and to some alone which though it doth invest them with a power of judicature confers not any thing upon them which belongs to Sovereignty Then for the Commons all which the Writ doth call them to is facere consentire to do and consent unto such things which are ordained by the Lords and Common Council of the Kingdom of England and sure conformity and consent which is all the Writ requireth from them are no marks of Sovereignty nor can an Argument be drawn from thence by the subtlest Sophister to shew that they are called to be partakers of the Sovereign power or that the King intends to denude himself of any branch or leaf thereof to hide their nakedness And being met together in a body collective they are so far from having any share in Sovereignty that they cannot properly be called a Court of Judicature as neither having any power to minister an Oath Id. p. 9. or to imprison any body except it be some of their own Members if they see occasion which are things incident to all Courts of Justice and to every Steward of a Leet insomuch that the House of Commons is compared by some and not incongruously unto the Grand Inquest at a general Sessions whose principal work it is to receive Bills and prepare businesses Review of the Observat p. 22. and make them fit and ready for my Lords the Judges Nay so far were they heretofore from the thoughts of Sovereignty that they were lyable to sutes and punishments for things done in Parliament though only to the prejudice of a private Subject until King Henry VIII most graciously passed a Law for their indemnity For whereas Richard Strode one of the company of Tinners in the County of Cornwall being a Member of the Commons House had spoken somewhat to the prejudice of that Society and contrary to the Ordinances of the Stanneries at his return into the Country he was Arrested Fined Imprisoned Complaint whereof being made in Parliament the King passed a Law to this effect viz. That all suites condemnations 4 Hen. 8. c. 8. executions charges and impositions put or hereafter to be put upon Richard Strode and every of his Complices that be of this Parliament or any other hereafter for any Bill speaking or reasoning of any thing concerning the Parliament to be communed and treated of shall be void and null But neither any reparation was allowed to Strode nor any punishment inflicted upon those that sued him for ought appears upon Record And for the Houses joyned together which is the last capacity they can claim it in they are so far from having the supream Authority that as it is observed by a learned Gentleman they cannot so unite or conjoyn as to be an entire Court either of Sovereign or Ministerial jurisdiction no otherwise co-operating than by concurrence of Votes in their several Houses for preparing matters in order to an Act of Parliament Case of our Affairs p. 9. Which when they have done they are so far from having any legal Authority in the State as that in Law there is no stile nor form of their joynt Acts nor doth the Law so much as take notice of them until they have the Royal Assent So that considering that the two Houses alone do no way make an entire Body or Court and that there is no known stile nor form of any Law or Edict by the Votes of the two Houses only nor any notice taken of them by the Law it is apparent that there is no Sovereignty in their two Votes alone How far the practice of the Lords and Commons which remain'd at Westminster after so many of both Houses had repaired to the King c. may create Precedents unto Posterity I am not able to determine but sure I am they have no Precedent to shew from the former Ages But let us go a little further and suppose for granted that the Houses either joynt or separate be capable of the Sovereignty were it given unto them I would fain know whether they claim it from the King or the People only Not from the King for he confers upon them no further power than to debate and treat of his great Affairs to have access unto his person freedom of speech as long as they contain themselves within the bounds of Loyalty authority over their own Members Hakewell of passing Bills in Parliament which being customarily desired and of course obtained as it relates unto the Commons shews plainly that these vulgar priviledges are nothing more the rights of Parliament than the favours of Princes but yet such favours as impart not the least power of Sovereignty Nor doth the calling of a Parliament ex opere operato as you know who phrase it either denude the King of the poorest robe of all his Royalty or confer the same upon the Houses or on either of them whether the King intend so by his call or otherwise For Bodin whom Mr. Prynn hath honoured with the title of a grand Politician Prynn of Parliament par 2. p. 45. Bodin de Repub doth affirm expresly Principis majestatem nec Comitorum convocatione nec Senatus populique praesentia minui that the Majesty or Sovereignty of the King is not a jot diminished either by the calling of a Parliament or Conventus Ordinum or by the frequency and presence of his Lords and Commons Nay to say truth the Majesty of Sovereign Princes is never so transcendent and conspicuous as when they sit in Parliament with their States about them the King then standing in his highest Estate as was once said by Henry VIII who knew as well as any of the Kings of England how to keep up the Majesty of the Crown Imperial Nor can they claim it from the People who have none to give for nemo dat quod non habet as the saying is The King as hath been proved before doth hold his Royal Crown immediately from God himself not from the contract of the People He writes not populi clementia but Dei gratia not by the favour of the People but by the grace of God The consent and approbation of the People used and not used before the day of Coronation is reckoned only as a part of the solemn pomps which are then accustomably used The King is actually King to all intents and purposes in the Law whatever immediatly on the death of his Predecessor Nor ever was it otherwise objected in the Realm of England till Clark and Watson pleaded it at their Arraignment in the first year of King James Speeds History in K James Or grant