safely rely Though a Second part of his Institut pag. 487. some have said that this was no Statute but made by the Prelates themselves yet that this is an Act of Parliament it is proved not onely by our books but also by an Act of Parliament 17. The King to his Judges Were it of concernment it were not difficult to name the Prime Judges of England at this time Viz. 1. In the Kings or Vpper-Bench either Ralph de Hengham or which is more probable one Wymborne was Judge 2. In the Common-Pleas Thomas de Weyland on that token that he was guilty of Bribery 3. In the Exchequer Adam de Stratton as faulty as the former But by the Judges named in this Writ for as this was an Act of Parliament so was there a Writ also founded thereon called Circumspectè agatis we understand some peculiar Commissioners dispatch'd and employed on this particular business 18. Concerning the Bishop of Norwich It is needless to tell the Reader that William Middeton was Bishop thereof at this time b Chronicon Osniense charactred to be Vir in Jure Civili Canonico peritissmus elegantissmus But Norwich is here put onely for example which equally extended to all the Bishops of the Realme 19. Si placitum tenuerint if they hold plea Placitum a Plea so called saith my c Linwood his Constit lib. 2. tit De Foro competenti Author per antiphrasin quia non places none being pleased to go to Law save Barreters who delight in brangling But what if it be called placitum because the Plaintife is pleased to submit his right in question to the pleasure of the Court to decide it 20. In Court Christian These words are left out in Linwood his Constitutions where all the rest is registred And where the recording thereof amongst the Provincial Canons of Canterbury gave the best countenance to their conjecture who degrade this Act of Parliament into a meer Church-Constitution It is called the Court Christian because therein the Laws of Christ do or should bear the decisive sway whilest the Statutes of Secular Princes regulate the proceedings in other Courts 21. Such things as be meerly spiritual This furnisheth us with a necessary distinction of all matters Into meerly and purely mixtly and partly spiritual Of the former we shall finde very few meerly spiritual For the Apostles sometimes conceived that the very distribution of Almes to the poor had something of worldly drossiness therein called by them d Acts 6. 2. serving of tables as if onely the preaching of the word were a spiritual employment Of the latter sort many things are mixtly spiritual For seeing man consists of two principles soul and body all his actions good or bad as to the minde-moiety or soul-part thereof must needs have at least a glance of spiritual reflection Here then the Quaere will be in matters mixtly spiritual whether the spirituality of them shall refine the rest so as to exalt the same into Church-cognisance or the corporality or earthliness of them depress them so as to subject them to civil consideration the decision hereof dependeth on the practice and custom of the Land as will appear hereafter 22. For deadly sin Distinguish we here betwixt a sin deadly to the soul drawing damnation without repentance and a deadly commonly called a capital crime deserving death by humane Laws The former onely is here intended the latter belonging wholly to the Common-Law Nor did the punishment of every mortal sin to use the language of that age belong to Church-men seeing if so as Linwood no less Learnedly then modestly confesseth Sic periret temporalis gladii jurisdictio Thereby the power of the temporal sword will wholly be taken away Long since had Doctors-Commons eaten up all the Inns of Court if all things reducible to deadly sins had pertained to the Court-Christian And therefore the Casuists themselves do qualifie and confine these words of indefinite extent to such crimes which de sui naturâ spectant ad Forum Ecclesiasticum 23. As first fornication Here saith Linwood thirteen cases are in specie recited though I dare not reckon them up fearing to make them lying so confusedly moe or less Fornication that is saith the Casuist Soluti cum soluta the uncleanness of a loose understand unmarried with a loose person 24. Adultery These two alone are specified because lying in a middle distance so the more conveniently to reach other sins of this kinde of higher or lower guilt 1. Higher as Incest 2. Lower Soliciting a womans chastity If any say that Adultery doth not belong to the Court-Christian because Christ himself would not punish an a John 8. 4. 11. adulteress taken in the act waving it as an improper imployment It is answered that our Saviour appearing in privacy and poverty and coming not to act but to suffer not to judg but be judged justly declined all judicial power But we see afterward how the Church of Corinth by S t Paul his command proceeded against the incestuous person and at this time Church-men cleanly carried the cognisance of such offences I say at this time it plainly appearing that in the Conquerors time Fornication and Adultery were punishable in the Kings Court and the Leets especially by the name of LETHERWITE and the fines of offenders assessed to the King though now it meerly belonged to the Church As for a Rape being Adultery or at leastwise fornication offered with violence the common-Common-Law hath justly reserved to it self the trial and punishment thereof 25. And such like Here is an interpretative et-caetera inserted in the body of a Parliament Act and a Writ grounded thereon causing some differences about the Dimensions thereof For if these words And such like relate onely to the last foregoing Fornication and Adultery in common construction most probable then they onely fetch in such offences which have some tincture of Carnal uncleanness But if they also refer to the mediate preceding words deadly sins behold a troop cometh beyond our power exactly to number them And here Forein Casuists bring in a bundle of mortal sins all grist for their own Mill as of Church-cognisance namely Sacriledg Usury Heresie Simony Perjury Fortune-telling consulting Astrologers Drunkenness c. But it matters not how long and large their bills be from beyond the Seas seeing our Common-Law brings their reckonings to a new account defalking a great part of that measure which they make to themselves in favour of Church-Jurisdiction 26. For that the Church is uncovered It belonged ever to the Priests to provide for the decent reparation of Gods-House Thus Jehoiada b 2 Chro. 24. was careful to amend the decayes of the Temple But though it pertained to Church-men to see the thing done yet several persons were to do it 1. The Steeple with the Body of the Church and all Chappels lying in common thereunto are to be repaired at the joyn cost of the Parish 2.
Private Chappels wherein particular persons claim a propriety of sepulture at their own charges 3. The Chauncel at the expence of the Parson However in all these such respect is had to the custom of the place time out of minde that it often over-ruleth the premisses Quaere Whether the Fences of the Church-yard be to be made on the Parish-charges or on the purse of the several persons whose ground surroundeth it or abutteth on the same * Oblations and Tythes It is a question which I believe will never be decided to the contentment of both Parties in what notion Tythes belong to the Court-Christian 1. The Canonists maintaine That Originally and ex sua natura they are of Ecclesiastical cognizance as commonly avouched and generally believed due Jure Divino Besides such the near relation of the Church and its maintenance that to part the oyl from the lamp were to destroy it They produce also the Confession in the Statute of the first of Richard the second That pursuit for Tythes ought and of ancient time did pertain to the Spiritual Court 2. The Common-Lawyers defend That Tythes in their own nature are a civil thing and therefore by Britton who being Bishop of Heresord and learned in the Laws of this Realm was best qualified for an unpartial Judg herein omitted when treating of what things the Church hath cognizance They * Bracton lib. 5. fol. 401. affirm therefore that Tythes were annexed to the Spirituality Thus they expound those passages in Statutes of Tythes anciently belonging to Court-Christian as intended by way of concession and not otherwise But the Canonists are too sturdy to take that for a gift which they conceive is their due left thanks also be expected from them for enjoying the same and so we leave the question where we found it 27. Mortuary Because something of history is folded up in this word which may acquaint us with the practice of this age we will enlarge a little hereon and shew what a Mortuary was when to be paid by whom to whom and in what consideration 1. A Mortuary a Linwood Constit lib. 1. fol. 11. c. de Consuetudine was the second best quick cattel whereof the party died possessed If he had but two in all such forsooth the charity of the Church no Mortuary was due from him 2. It was often bequeathed by the dying but however alwayes payed by his Executors after his death thence called a Mortuary or Corse-present 3. By whom No woman under Covert-Baron was lyable to pay it and by proportion no children unmarried living under their Fathers tuition but Widows and all possessed of an Estate were subject to the payment thereof 4. To whom It was paid to the Priest of the Parish where the party dying received the Sacrament not where he repaired to prayers and if his house at his death stood in two Parishes the value of the Mortuary was to be divided betwixt them both 5. It was given in lieu of small or personal Tythes Predial Tythes are too great to be casually forgotten which the party in his life-time had though ignorance or negligence not fully paid But in case the aforesaid Mortuary fell far short of full satisfaction for such omissions Casuists maintain the dying party obliged to a larger restitution So much of Mortuaries as they were generally paid at the present until the time of Henry the sixth when learned Linwood wrote his Comment on that Constitution How Mortuaries were after reduced to a new regulation by a Statute in the twenty first of Henry the eighth pertains not to our present purpose 28. For laying violent hands on a Priest The Ecclesiastical Judg might proceed ex officio and pro salute animae punish the offender who offered violence to a Priest but dammages on Action of Battery were onely recoverable at Common-Law Note that the arresting of a Clergy-man by Process of Law is not to be counted a violence 29. And in cause of Defamation Where the matter defamatory is spiritual as to call one Heretick or Schismatick c. the plea lay in Court-Christian But defamations with mixture any matter determinable in the Common-Law as Thief Murderer c. are to be traversed therein 30. Defamation it hath been granted From this word granted Common-Lawyers collect let them alone to husband their own right that originally defamations pertained not to the Court-Christian From the beginning it was not so until the common-Common-Law by Acts of Parliament granted and surrendred such suits to the Spirituality 31. Thus by this Act and Writ of Circumspectè agatis No end can end an everlasting difference King Edward may seem like an expert Artist to cleave an hair betwixt the spiritual and temporal jurisdiction allowing the premisses to the former and leaving whatever is not specified in this Act to the Cognizance of the Common-Law according to the known and common Maxime Exceptio firmat regulam in non exceptis However for many years after there was constant heaving and shoving betwixt the two Courts And as there are certain lands in the Marches of England and Scotland whilest distinct Kingdomes termed Battable-grounds which may give for their Motto not Dentur justiori but Dentur fortiori for alway the strongest sword for the present possessed them So in controversial cases to which Court they should belong sometimes the Spirituality sometimes the Temporality alternately seized them into their Jurisdiction as power and favour best befriended them See more hereof on Articuli Cleri in the Reign of Edward the second But generally the Clergie complained that as in the blending of liquors of several colours few drops of red will give tincture to a greater quantity of white so the least mixture of Civil concernment in Religious matters so discolourated the Christian candor and purity thereof that they appeared in a temporal hue and under that notion were challenged to the Common-Law Sad when Courts that should be Judges turn themselves Plaintiffs and Defendents about the bounds of their Jurisdiction 32. We long since mentioned the first coming in of the Jews into England brought over by William the Conqueror and now are come this year to their casting out of this Kingdome A transition to the entire story of our English Jews having first premised some observables concerning their continuance therein 1290. If hitherto we have not scattered our History with any discourse of the Jews 18. know it done by design that as they were enjoyned by our Laws to live alone in streets by themselves not mixing in their dwellings with Christians so we purposely singled out their story and reserved it by it self for this one entire relation thereof 33. They were scattered all over England Their principal residence in London In Cambridg Bury Norwich Lin Stanford Northampton Lincoln York and where not But their principal aboad was in London where they had their Arch-Synagogue at the North corner of the Old-Jury as opening
Robert Barns Doctor of Divinity Thomas Abley Thomas Gerard Rich Fetherston William a Godwin in Henry the 8. pag. 131. Jerom Bachelours of Divinity This caused was by the difference of Religions in the King 's Privie Councel wherein the Popish party called for the execution of these b Fox in his Book of Martyrs 2 volume p. 529. Protestants whilest the Protestant Lords in the Councell out of policy to represse the others eagernesse or if that failed out of desire to revenge it cried as fast that the Laws might take effect on the Papists And whilest neither side was able to save those of their own opinions both had power to destroy those of their opposite party They were dragged on hurdles coupled two and two a Papist and a Protestant cattel of different kindes yoked to draw or rather to be drawn together insomuch as a c Sanders de schismate Angl. lib. 1. pag. 192. Romanist professeth that to the three Papists this their unequal matching was to them ipsâ morte gravlus intolerabilius more heavy and intolerable than death it self But the Protestants exprest no such distast hereat not angry out of principles of pride for the joyning of their bodies together but grieved out of the grounds of charity that their souls soon after should so farre be parted asunder A stranger standing by did wonder as well he might what Religion the King was of his sword cutting on both sides Protestants for Hereticks and Papists for Traytors of whom in the same moneth Laurence Cooke Prior of Doncaster and six others were sent the same way for the same offence 34. But to return to such Acts of the Parliament as concern the Church A Statute made for recovery of Tithes therein a Statute was made commanding every man d 32 Hen. 8. cap. 7. fully truly and effectually to divide set out yield or pay all and singular Tithes and Offerings according to the lawfull customes and usages of the Parishes and Places where such Tithes or Duties shall grow arise come or be due And remedy is given for Ecclesiastick persons before the Ordinary and for Lay-men that claimed appropriated Tithes by grant from the Crown in the Secular Courts by such actions as usually Lay-possessions had been subject to The occasion of which Statute is intimated in the Preamble thereof because in few years past many presumed more contemptuously and commonly than in times past had been seen or known to substract and withdraw their lawfull and accustomed Tithes Incouraged thereunto for that that divers Lay-persons having Tithes to them and their beires had no due remedy by order and course of the Ecclesiastical Laws to recover their right And no wonder seeing their Soveraign had set them so large and so late a president in destroying of Abbies if subjects thought that in their distance and proportion they might also be bold to detain the Rites of the Church especially because it seemed unreasonable that they should receive wages who did no work and that the hire of the labourers in the vineyard should be given to lazie lookers on This Statute in favour of Lay-impropriators was beneficiall to the Clergie to recover their prediall Tithes at Common-Law being equally advantaged by that which was not principally intended for them because of the concurrence of their interest in case of Tithes A e 32 Hen. 8. cap. 38. Statute also made That it was lawfull for all persons to contract marriage who are not prohibited by Gods law For although Gregory the great who had not lesse learning but more modesty than his successours did not flatly forbid the marriage of Cousin Germans as unlawfull but prudentially disswade it as unfitting yet after-Popes prohibited that and other degrees further off thereby to get money for Dispensations What a masse these amounted unto their own Auditors can onely compute seeing f 1 Kings 10. 22. Solomon himself sent ships but every third year to Ophir for gold whereas his Holinesse by granting such faculties from those Indies made annuall returns of infinite profit And this Law came very conveniently to comply with King Henry's occasions who had the first fruits thereof and presently after married Katharine Howard Cousin Germane to Anna Bollen his second Wife which by the canon-Canon-Law formerly was forbidden without a speciall Dispensation first obtained 35. But now to step out of the Parliament into the Convocation Acts of this yeares Convocation a place more proper for our employment there we shall finde Archbishop Cranmer landing in his Barge at Pauls-wharfe and thence proceeding on foot with the Cross carried before him into the Quire of Pauls where at the high Altar Bishop Bonner officiated if I speak properly a Masse of the Holy Ghost Doctor Richard Cox Archdeacon of Ely preached a Latine Sermon on this text Vos estis salterrae Richard Gwent Doctor of Law and Archdeacon of London was chosen Prolocutor Then intimation was given that the KING allowed them liberty to treat of matters in Religion to peruse the Canons de simonia vitanda with other Ecclesiasticall constitutions to continue the good ones and make new ones protemporis exigentiâ In the third Session on Friday severall Bishops * Transcribed with my owne hand out of the Records of Canterbury were assigned to peruse severall Books of the Translation of the New Testament in order as followeth 1 Archbishop Cranmer 1 Matthew 2 John g Longland Lincolne 2 Mark 3 Stephen h Gardiner Winchester 3 Luke 4 Thomas i Goodrick Elie 4 John 5 Nicholas k Heath Rochester 5 Acts of the Apostles 6 Richard l Sampson Chichester 6 Romans 7 John m Capon Sarum 7 ◠Corinthians 8 William n Barlow S. Davids 8 Galatians Ephesians Philippians Colossians 9 John o Bell. Worcester 9 1 2 Thessalonians 10 Robert p Parsew S. Asaph 10 Timothy Titus Philemon 11 Robert q Holgate Landaffe 11 1 2 Peter 12 John r Skip Hereford 12 Hebrews 13 Thomas ſ Thyrlby Westminster 13 James 1 2 3 John Jude 14 John t Wakeman Glocester 14 Revelation 15 John u Chambers Peterborough 15 Why Edmond Bonner Bishop of London then and there present had no part in this perusall allotted him as I finde no reason rendred thereof so I will not interpose my own conjecture 39. In the sixth Session Words in the Testament which Gardiner desired might be preserved intire in the Translation Gardiner publickly read a Catalogue of Latine words of his own collection out of the Testament and desired that for their genuine and native meaning and for the majesty of the matter in them contained these words might be retained in their own nature as much as might bee or be very fitly Englished with the least alteration being in number and order here inserted Ecclesia Poenitentia Pontifex Ancilla Contritus * Acta Synod Cant. an 1541. pag. 48 49. Olacausta
net of Reformation as slipping through the holes thereof and therefore no way to represse their faults except by suppressing their foundation All I will adde is God first punished great Sodome and spared little Zoar though probably also in fault here Zoar was first punished let great Sodome beware and the larger Monasteries look to themselves 5. And now adieu all religious Houses in England that could not cleerly spend above Two hundred pounds per annum Exact measuring to the standard of dissolution and we must not believe any finister dealing was used by favour to wrack the revenues of some above and out of dislike to shrink the rents of others beneath the standard of dissolution when Twenty shillings a year under or over the aforesaid summe might save or destroy a small Monastery As for such if any in that posture who had just Two hundred pounds and no more they were obnoxious to the Statute whilst Five shillings more saved all as that is a fair ball in the Tennis-Court which toucheth the line yet goeth over it 6. Ten thousand persons were by this dissolution sent to seek their fortunes in the wide world Many aged persons at a losse for livelihood some indeed had Fathers or Friends to receive them others none at all some had Twenty shillings given them at their Ejection and a new Gown which needed to be of strong cloath to last so long till they got another Most were exposed to want I see no such certainty for a comfortable livelihood as a lawfull calling for Monkish profession was no possession and many a young Nun proved an old Beggar I pity not those who had hands and health to work but surely the gray hairs of some impotent persons deserved compassion and I am confident such had they come to the doors of the charitable Reader hereof should have had a meals meat and a nights lodging given unto them 7. A clear Revenue of Thirty thousand pounds per annum Abbey-lands politickly scattered among many puâ—chasers was here advanced to the Crown besides Ten thousand pounds in plate and moveables though the King enjoyed it but a short time as passing it away by grant sale and exchange to His Subjects This was done by the politick counsell of the wise Lord Cromwell not hoping that these small morsels to so many mouthes should satisfie their hunger but onely intending to give them a taste of the sweetnesse of Abbey-lands And here Papists plentifully rail upon him in scattering these Lands all abroad that if any should be so scrupulous as to finde fault with the fact a general guiltinesse should amount unto innocence Thus say they there is no fear that a man shall be condemned for felony who hath so many receivers in the County that scarcely a Judge can sit and surely no Jury can be impanelled upon him saving such who had been parties with him 8. No fewer than Three hundred seventy five Covents as Sanders doth account them were dissolved at this time sure I am The number of the lesser Monasteries none was left standing in the whole Diocesse of Bangor where no Foundation was valued c See Speed his Catalogue of Valuations at full seventy pounds per annum 9. We must not forget how in the foresaid Preamble Why the King cajoleth the great Monasteries the King fairly claweth the great Monasteries wherein saith He Religion thanks be to God is right well kept and observed though He clawed them soon after in another acceptation The truth is King Henry could not suppresse the lesser Abbeys but by the consent of the greater Abbots whereof twenty six as Barons voted in the Parliament who mollified them by this Commendation into a Concurrence with His desire 10. However Specious uses pretended on heavy penalties most specious uses were pretended though few perchance had faith firm enough to believe their full performance That all should be done to the pleasure of Almighty God and for the honour of the Realm And particular care is taken in the Statute as it is printed for the reservation of many Rents and Services Corrodice and Pensions to Founders Donours and Benefactors Order also was taken that those to whom Abbey-lands were passed should keep or cause to be kept a continual House and Houshold in the same Site or Precinct They were also to occupy yearly as much of the demeans in Tilledge as the Abbots did or their Farmers under them within the time of twenty years next before this Act otherwise forfeiting to the King's Highnesse for every Moneth so offending 6 lib. 13s 4 d. to be recovered to His use in any of His Courts of Record The arrears whereof if rigoroussly exacted would amount to a vast summe from such Offenders whose hospitality was contracted to a Shepheard and his Dog neither relieving those that would work by industry nor such who could not work by their charity 11. These penalties stood in full force above eighty years Such penalties graciously repealed by King Iames. viz untill the 21 of King Iames when by Act of Parliament they were repealed Indeed such who are obnoxious to penall Statutes are onely innocent by courtesie and may be made guilty at their Princes pleasure And though such Statutes may be dormant as disused they are never dead till revoked seeing commonly Princes call on such Statutes when themselves are called on by their necessities Many of the English Gentry knew themselves subject to such penalties when instead of maintaining Tillage had converted the Granges of Abbeys into inclosures And therefore provided for their own safety when they * See the Statutes the 21 of K. James c. 28. wrought the King to a revocation of those Statutes 12. But the Courtiers grudged at this Grant and great Indulgence given by the King without any valuable compensation some sticking not to say Some grudge at so great a grant That hereby the King at once gave His Subjects more than ever they gave Him in Subsidies Benevolences Contributions or any other way whatsoever all the time of His Reign Which if so Let no mans eye be evil because the King 's was so good to His Subjects The Northern Rebellion occasioned by this dissolution WHen all in the School are equally guilty Northern Rebellion and the Master beginneth at the bottome to correct the least boyes first no wonder if those in the highest form begin to shake as here no doubt the bigger Abbeys did except some few who to follow the Metaphor like sturdy striplings counting themselves above correction began to prepare themselves to make resistance hence presently arose the Northern Rebellion wherein all the open Undertakers were North of Trent though no doubt many secret Compliers South of Thames were ingaged 2. This Commotion began first in Lincoln shire begun suppressed punished where the Rebels presented six Articles to the King in the last whereof they complained That divers Bishops of England of
legall Tryall is the greatest torment in the World God keepe all good men from feeling and chiefly from deserving it I am the easier induced to believe the Exquisitenesse of the Torture being sensible in my self by your bounty what a burden it is for One who would be ingenuous to be Loaded with Curtesies which He hath not the least hope to requite or deserve 1. IN this year began the Suit betwixt Robert Horne Bishop of Winchester The suit betwixt Bp. Horne and Bonner and Edmund Bonner late Bishop of London on this occasion All Bishops were impowred by the statute quinto Elizabethae to tender the Oath of Supremacy to all persons living within their Diocess Now Bishop Bonner was within the Diocess of Winchester full ill against his will as being a Prisoner in the Marshall-See in Southwarke to whom Horne offered this Oath and he refused the taking thereof Hereupon his refusall was returned into the Kings-Bench and he indicted on the same Being indicted he appeared there confessed the fact but denied himself culpable and intending to traverse the Indictment desired that Councell might be assigned him S r. Robert Cateline then Chief Justice granted his motion and no meaner then Ploydon that eminent Lawyer Christopher Wray afterwards Lord Chief Justice and Lovelace were deputed his Councell 2. First they pleaded for their Client Bonner his Councell that Bonner was indicted without the title and addition of Bishop of London and only stiled Doctour of Law and one in Holy Orders But the Judges would not allow the exception as legall to avoid the Indictment 3. Secondly Their 1. Plea 2. Exception they pleaded that the Certificate entred upon Record was thus brought into the Court. Tali die anno per A. B. Cancellarium dicti Episcopi Winton And did not say per mandatum Episcopi for the want of which clause Bonner his Councell took exceptions thereat sed non allocatur because the Record of it by the Court is not of necessity 4. Pass we by their third exception Main matter debared by the Judges that he was indicted upon that Certificat in the County of Middlesex by the common Jury of enquest in the Kings-Bench for that County It being resolved by the Judges that his triall could not be by a Jury of Middlesex but by a Jury of Surrie of the neighbourhood of Southwark The main matter which was so much debated amongst all the Judges in the Lord Cateline his chamber was this Whether Bonner could give in evidence of that issue that he had pleaded of not guilty that Horne Bishop of Winchester was not a Bishop tempore oblationis Sacramenti at the time wherein he tendred the oath unto Bonner And it was resolved by them a Dyer fol. 234 Mich. 6. 7. El. z. plaâ—â—to 15. all that if the truth of the matter was so indeed that he might give that in evidence upon that issue and that the Jury might trie whether he was a Bishop then or no. 5. Whilest this suit as yet depended Divided by the Parliament Eliz. 8. Sept. 30. 1567. the Queen called a Parliament which put a period to the controversie and cleared the legality of Horne his Episcopacy in a Satute enacting That all persons that have been or shall be made oâ—d red or consicrate Arch-Bishops Bishops Priests Ministers of Gods Holy Word and Sacraments or Deacons after the forme and order prescribed in the said order and form how Arch-Bishops Bishops Priests Deacons and Ministers should be consecrated made and ordered be in very deed and also by authority hereof declared and enacted to be and shall be Arch-Bishops Bishops Priests Ministers and Deacons and rightly made consecrated and ordered Any Statute law Canon or other thing to the contrary notwithstanding 6. However it immediately followeth A favourable proviso Provided alwayes and nevertheless be it enacted by the authority aforesaid that no person or persons shall at any time hereafter be impeached or molested in body lands livings or goods by occasion or mean of any Certificate by any Arch-Bishop or Bishop heretofore made or before the last day of this present Session of Parliament to be made by vertue of any Act made in the first Session of Parliament touâ—hing or concerning the refusal of the oath declared and set forth by Act of Parliament in the first yeer of the Reign of our said Soveraign Ladie Queen Elizabeth Any thing in this Act or any other Act or Statute her tofâ—re made to the contrary notwithstanding 7. The seasonable interposing of this Statute made it a Drawn battell betwixt Horne and Bonner Their suit superseded The former part thereof here alledged cleared Horne his Episcopacy from all cavils of law the later Proviso was purposely inserted in favour of Bonner who here himself found that which he never shewed to others that he as all other Popish Bishops deprived might be no more molested for refusing the Oath of Supremacy The Parliament saw they had already lost their livelihood and liberties for their erroneous consciences and had received their thirty nine stripes more then which the State thought not fit to inflict lest their justice should degenerate into cruelty 8. The enacting of this Statute did not stop the railing mouths of Papists against our Bishops but only made them alter their note and change their tune in reviling them Formerly they condemned them as illegall whose calling was not sufficiently warranted by the laws of the Land henceforward * 〈…〉 Sanders and others railed on them for Parliamentary Bishops deriving all their Power and Commission from the State But as well might the Jesuits terme b 〈…〉 pag. 449. Cuâ—on 17. Shemaiah Nethaniah Prerogative Levites because sent by Jehâ—saphat to preach the word to the people of the Land For that good King did not give but quicken and encourage their Commission to teach as here the Parliament did only publish notifie and declare the legall authority of the English Bishops whose Call and Consecration to their place was formerly performed derived from Apostolicall or at leastwise Ecclesiastical institution 9. These were the prime of the first Set of Puritans Anno Regin Eliza. 8. Anno Dom. 1567. The Ring leader of the second set of Nonconformiâ—â—s which being very aged expired for the most part at or about this time when behold another generation of Active and zealous Nonconformists succeeded them Of these Coleman Button Halingham and Benson whose Christian names I cannot recover were the chief inveighing against the established Church-Discipline accounting every thing from Rome which was not from Geneva endeavouring in all things to conforme the government of the English Church to the Presbyterian Reformation Add these three more though of inferiour note to the aforesaid Quaternion William White Thomas Rowland Robert Hawkins all beneficed within the Diocess of London and take a tast of their Spirits out of the Register thereof 10. For this
quickly be perused and yet then no such effigiation was therein discovered which some nineteen weeks after became visible about the nineteenth of September following Surely had this pregnant straw gone out its full time of fourty weeks it would have been delivered of a perfect picture indeed whereas now miscarrying before that time wonder not if all things were not so complete therein 54. For the face therein was not so exact Not perfectly done as which might justly intitle heaven to the workmanship thereof Say not it was done in too small a scantling to be accurate for Deus est maximus in minimis Gods exquisitenesse appears the most in q Exod. 8. 18. modells Whereas when Witnesses were examined about this mock-miracle before the Archbishop of Canterbury Francis Bowen deposed that he believed that a good Artisan might have drawn one more curiously and Hugh Griffith himself attested that it was no more like Garnet than to any other man who had a beard and that it was so small none could affirm it to resemble him adding moreover that there was no glory or streaming raies about it which some did impudently report 55. However Garnet's beâ—tification occasioned by this mock-miracle this inspirited straw was afterward copied out and at Rome printed in pomp with many superstitious copartments about it as a coronet a crosse and nails more than ever were in the originall Yea this miracle how silly and simple soever gave the ground-work to Garnet's beatification by the Pope some moneths after Indeed Garnet complained before his death That he could not expect that the Church should own him for a Martyr and signified the same in his Letter to his dear Mistresse Anne but for her sirname call her Garnet or Vaux as you please because nothing of religion and onely practices against the State were laid to his charge It seemed good therefore to his Holinesse not to canonize Garnet for a solemn Saint much lesse for a Martyr but onely to beatificate him which if I mistake not in their heavenly heraldrie is by Papists accounted the least and lowest degree of celestiall dignity and yet a step above the Commonaltie or ordinary sort of such good men as are saved This he did to qualifie the infamie of Garnet's death and that the perfume of this new title might out-sent the stench of his treason But we leave this Garnet loth longer to disturb his blessednesse in his own place and proceed to such Church-matters as were transacted in this present Parliament 56. Evil manners prove often though against their will the parents of good laws Acts against Papists in Parliament but principally the Oath of Obedience as here it came to passe The Parliament begun and holden at Westminster the fifth of November and there continued till the 27 of May following enacted many things for the discovering and repressing of Popish Recusants extant at large in the printed Statutes Whereof none was more effectuall than that Oath of Obedience which every Catholick was commanded to take the form whereof is here inserted The rather because this Oath may be termed like two of Isaac's r Gen. 26. 20. 21. wells Esek and Sitnah Contention and Hatred the subject of a tough controversie versie betwixt us and Rome about the legall urging and taking thereof Protestants no lesse learnedly asserting than Papists did zealously oppose the same The form of which Oath is as followeth I A. B. doe truly and sincerely acknowledge professe testifie and declare in my conscience before God and the world That our Soveraigne Lord King James is lawfull and rightfull King of this Realm and of all other His Majesties Dominions and Countreys and that the Pope neither of himself nor by any authority of the Church or See of Rome or by any other means with any other hath any power or authority to depose the King or to dispose any of His Majesties Kingdomes or Dominions or to authorize any forraign Prince to invade or annoy Him or His Countâ—â— or to discharge any of His subjects of their allegiance and obedience to His Majestie or to give licence or leave to any of them to bear armes raise tumult or to offer any violence or hurt to His Majesties Royall Person State or Government or to any of His Majesties subjects within His Majesties Dominions Also I doe swear from my heart that notwithstanding any declaration or sentence of Excommunication or deprivation made or granted or to be made or granted by the Pope or his Successours or by any authority derived or pretended to be derived from him or his See against the said King His Heires or Successours or any absolution of the said subjects from their obedience I will bear faith and true allegiance to His Majestie His Heires and Successours and Him and Them will defend to the uttermost of my power against all conspiracies and attempts whatsoever which shall be made against His or Their Persons Their Crown and Dignity by reason or colour of any such sentence or declaration or otherwise and will doe my best endeavour to disclose and make known unto His Majestie His Heires and Successours all treasons and traiterous conspiracies which I shall know or hear of to be against Him or any of Them And I doe farther swear That I doe from my heart abhorre detest and abjure as impious and hereticall this damnable doctrine and position That Princes which be excommunicated or deprived by the Pope may be deposed or murthered by Their subjects or any other whatsoever And I do believe and in conscience am resolved that neither the Pope nor any person whatsoever hath power to absolve me of this Oath or any part thereof which I acknowledge by good and full authority to be lawfully ministred unto me and doe renounce all Pardons and Dâ—spensations to the contrary And all these things I doe plainly and sincerely acknowledge and swear according to these express words by me spoken and according to the plain and common sense and understanding of the same words without any equivocation or mentall evasion or secret reservation whatsoever And I doe make this recognition and acknowledgment heartily willingly and truly upon the true faith of a Christian So help me God This Oath was devised to discriminate the pernicious from the peaceable Papists Sure binde sure finde And the makers of this were necessitated to be larger therein because it is hard to strangle equivocation which if unable by might to break will endeavour by slight to slip the halter 57. No sooner did the newes thereof arrive at the ears of his Holiness The Pope his two Breve's against this Oath but presently he dispatcheth his Å¿ See K. James his Works pag. 250. Breve into England prohibiting all Catholicks to take this Oath so destructive to their own souls and the See of Rome exhorting them patiently to suffer persecution and manfully to endure martyrdome And because report was raised that the Pope wrote this
Switzerland where a Congregation of English Exiles in the Reign of Q. Marry b. 8. p. 26. ¶ 41. ALCUINUS or Albinus an eminent Scholar and opposer of Image-worship Cent. 8. ¶ 40. ALFRED the Saxon Monarch his admirable act Cent. 9. ¶ 25. c. foundeth an University at Oxford ¶ 29. c. a soleman Councill kept by him ¶ 42. with the Canons made therein ibidem his death ¶ 44. ALIEN Priors b. 6. p. 33. ¶ 1. 2. of two natures ¶ 3. shaken by other Kings ¶ 4. but dissolved by King Henry 5. ¶ 5. William ALLEN Cardinal his death and character b. 9. p. 229. ¶ 12. William AMESE his bitter Sermon against Cards and Dice Hist of Cam. p. 159. ¶ 41. 42. leaveth Christs Colledge for his non-Conformity ¶ 43. AMPHIBALUS so named first by I. Munmoth Cent. 4. ¶ 6. Martyred at Redbourn in Hartfortshirt ¶ 7. the fancies about his stake confuted ibidem ANABAPTISTS their beginning in Engalnd l. 5. 249. ¶ 11. discovered in London b. 9. p. 104. ¶ 12. eleven condemned and two burnt ¶ 13. Lancâ—â—â— ANDREWS his death and character b. 11. 9. 46 47 48 49. Q. ANNA King of the East-Saxons happy in his children Cent. 7. ¶ 82. Q. ANNE Wite to King Iames her signal letter to the own of Rippon b. 10. ¶ 15. ANSELEME Arch-bishop of Cant. b 3. p. 11. ¶ 30. refuseth to lend King Rufus a 1000. pounds ¶ 32. Variance betwixt him and King Rufus p. 12. ¶ 36. c. holdeth a Synod at Weftminster p. 16. ¶ 3. the constitutions thereof p. 16 17 18 19. sent to Rome p. 20. ¶ 5. forbids Priests marriage ¶ 7. but dyeth re infecta p. 23. ¶ 18. Io. ARGENTINE challengeth all Cambridge to dispute much him Hist of Cam. p. 64. ¶ 28 c. ARIMINUM British Bishops present at the Councell kept therein Cent. 4. ¶ 20. And why they refused ot receive a Salary from the Emperour ibidem ARLES British Bishops present at the Councell kept therein Cent. 4. ¶ 20. ARISTOBULUS fabulously made by Grecian writers a Bishop of Britain Cent. 1. ¶ 8. ARMES in noble Families still extant relating to the Atchievements of their Ancestours in the holy Land b. 3. p. 40 41 42 43. ARRIANISME infpected England as appears by Gildas his complaint Cent. 4. ¶ 21. King ARTHUR a real worthy of Britain though his actions be much discredited with Monkish fictions Cent. 6. ¶ 2. The SIX ARTICLES contrived by Bishop Gardiner b. 5. p. 203 ¶ 17. to the great trouble of poore Protestants ¶ 18. The 30. ARTICLES composed b. 9. p. 72. ¶ 51. why drawn up in generall terms ¶ 52. by those who had been Confessours 53. confirmed by Statute 55. imposed onely on the Clergy ¶ 56. The 20 th ARTICLE concerning the Authority of the Church questioned b. 9. p. 73. inserted in some omitted in other Editions p. 74. ¶ 85. defended by Bishop Laud against Mr. Burton ¶ 59. ARTICLES of Lambeth see Lambeth Thomas ARUNDEL when Arch-bishop of York a cruel persecutour b. 4. p. 151. ¶ 42. when Archbishop of Cant active in deposing King Rich the second p. 153. ¶ 54. visiteth the Vniversity of Cambridge and all the Colledges therein Hist of Cam. p. 59. 60 c. Affronted at Oxford b. 4. p. 164. ¶ 125. but by the Kings help too hard for the Students p. 165. ¶ his wofull death p. 166. ¶ 30. St. ASAPH his pious Expression Cent. 6. ¶ 13. Iohn ASCHWELL challengeth all Camb. Hist of Camb. P. 104. ¶ 44. his bad successe ¶ 45. c. Anne ASCOUGH b. 5. p. 242. ¶ 44. Plea for leaving her Husband ¶ 45. first wracked then burnt 46. her prose and poetry 47. Mr. ASHLE his difference at Frankford with Mr. Home book 8. p. 32 33. ¶ 11. The sad consequences occasioned thereby ¶ 12. 13. ASSEMBLEY of Divines their first meeting b. 11. ¶ 1. consisteth of four English quarters p. 198. ¶ 2. besides the Scotish Commissioners p. 199. ¶ 3. the reasons of the Royalists why they would not joyne with them b. 11. p. 199. ¶ 5. first petition for a fast p. 200. ¶ 8. troubled with Mr. Selden b. 11. p. 213. ¶ 54. and with the Erastians ¶ 55. c. sâ—rewdly checkt for excceding their bounds p. 214. ¶ 58. their Monuments p. 215. ¶ 66. rather sinketh then endeth ¶ 67. King ATHELSTAN his principle Laws enacted at Greatlea Cent. ¶ 9. 10. ATHELWOLPHUS Monarch of the Saxons maketh equivalently a Parliament act for the paying of Tithes Cent. 9. ¶ 8. Objections against the validity thereof answered ¶ 9 10. et sequentibus Granteth Peter-Pence to the Pope ¶ 15. St. AUDRE her chastity Cent. 7. ¶ 108. twice a Wife still a Maid ¶ 109. c. her moraculius monumont confuted ¶ 111. c. St. AUGUSTINE the worthy Father Bishop of Hippo said to be born on the same day with Pelagius the Heretick Cent. 5. ¶ 2. AURELIUS AMBROSIUS erectech a monument in Memory of his Conquest over the Britans Cent. 5. ¶ 25. Causelesly slandered by an Italian writer ¶ 28. AUGUSTINE the MONK sent by P. Gregory to Convert England b. 2. Cent. 6. ¶ 2. by him shrinking for fear is encourageo ¶ 3. mocked by women in his passage ¶ 4. landeth in England ¶ 5. why chusing rather to be Arch-bishop of Cant. then London C. 7. ¶ 1. summons a Synod under his AKE ¶ 2. his proud carriage therein towards the British Clergy ¶ 3. c. his prophesy ¶ 8. arraigned as guilty of murdering the Monks of Bagnor ¶ 10. c. acquitted by the moderation of Mr. Fox ¶ 14. baptiseth ten thousand in one day ¶ 19. his ridiculous miracle ¶ 22. death and Epitaph ¶ 24. without the date of the year ¶ 25 a farewell to him with his character ¶ 26. AUGUSTINEAN Monks b. 6. p. 268. ¶ 67. Colchester their chief seat ibidem AUGMENTATION court the erection use cause name abolishing thereof b. 6. p. 348 349. AUGUSTINEAN Friers b. 6. p. 273. ¶ 1. The same in Oxford turned into Wadham Coll. b. 10. p. 68. ¶ 30. learned writers of their Order bred in Cambridge Hist of Camb. p. 30. B. Gervase BABINGTON Bishop of Worcester his death and praise b. 10. p. 56. ¶ 32 33. Roger BACON a great School-man and Matheamtician falsty accused for a Conjurer C. 14. p. 96. ¶ 17. many of that name confounded into one ¶ 18. John BACONTHOR p a little man and great Scholar p. 97. ¶ 20. BAILIOL COLL. founded by J. Bailiol b. 3. p. 67. and 68. Philip BAKER Provost of Kings an honest Papist Hist of Cam. p. 142. ¶ 4. John BALE Bishop of Ossory his death character and excusable passion b. 9. p. 67. ¶ 37 38 39. Bishop BANCROFT causlesly condemned for keeping Popish Priests in his house b. 10. ¶ 1. his behaviour in Hampton-Court Conference p. 9. et sequentibus violently prosecuteth Mr. Fuller unto his death in Prison p. 55 56. ¶ 29. 30. his death 34. vindicated
Monarchs of the Saxon Heptarchie but not successive and fixed in a Family but fluctuating from one Kingdome to another Egbert father to this Athelwolph was the first that atchieved this Monarchie and left it to this his Son not Monarcha factus but natus and so in unquestionable Power to make the foresaid Act obligatory over all the Land 9. Indeed Former Acts for Tithes infirme before his time many Acts for Tithes are produced which when pressed will prove of no great Validity Such are the Imperiall Edicts in Civil Law never possessed of full power in England as also the Canons of some Councils Popes never admitted into plenary Obedience by consent of Prince and People Adde to these first such Laws as were made by King Ina and Offa Monarchs indeed of England in their turns as I may say but not deriving the same to the Issue of their Bodies So that their Acts as personall may by some froward Spirits be cavilled at as determining with their own Lives Joyn to these if produceable any Provinciall Constitutions of an English Arch-bishop perchance Egbertus of York those might obey them who would obey being otherwise not subject to any civil Penalty But now this Act of Athelwolphus appears entire in all the Proportions of a Law made in his great Council equivalent to after Parliaments not only cum consilio Episcoporum with the Advice of his Bishops which easily may be presumed willingly to concurre in such a matter of Church-advancement but also Principum meorum of my Princes saith he the Consent of Inferiour persons not being required in that Age. 10. However Objections against this Act answered noting can be so strong but it may meet with Cavills though not to destroy to disturb the Validity thereof as this Act hath and we will severally examine the Defects charged upon it 1. Obj. Some object that Althelwolphus was but King of the West-Saxons as appears by his Stile Rex occidentalium Saxonum and not universall Monarch of England whose Act onely is obligatory to his own Subjects Let those of Cornwall Devon Somerset Dorset Hants VVilts and Berks pay Tithes by vertue of this Command other Parts of the Land are freed from the same because nihil dat quod non habet none can derive that to others which they enjoy not themselves being King but of a Part he could not lay this Law upon all the Land Ans He is tearmed eminently not exclusively King of the VVest-Saxons being fondest of that Title as his Fathers first Inheritance before he acquired the Monarchy of the whole Land There were indeed at this time two other Royalets as onely Kings by his leave viz Beorred King of Mercia and Edmond King of East-Angles who as it plainly appears by a Exemplified in S r. Henry Spelman's Councils pag. 348. Ingulphus were present at his Council and consented to the Acts thereof 2. Obj. The Consideration was superstitious Anno Dom. 855 to say so many Masses for the Souls of this King and his Captains when deceased Anno Rigis Ethelwolphi 18 Ans A double Consideration is mentioned in this Grant The first generall so pious in it's self no Exception can be taken thereat viz. to divert the imminents Iudgements of God from the Land hourly fearing the Invasion of fierce forraign Pagans so the better to secure the Nine parts thereof to himself and his Subjects by setting apart resigning and surrendring a Tenth to God the supreme Land-lord of all in such as attended his daily Service The second Consideration is more restrictive and particular and resents indeed of the Ignorance of that Age but yet is proportionable to the best Devotion those dayes produced and easily may an accidentall Abuse be purged by the pious Use intended and designed generally to Gods Glory 3. Obj. The King onely granted Tithes of his own Crown-land non in Dominio sed in Domintco suo not in all his Dominions but onely in his Demesnes Ans There needed no such solemn Consent of the Council of the Land for the passing away of his Private Bounty And that the Grant extended to the Kingdome in Generall appears by a Hen Hunting Hist l. 5. pag. 348. other Authours on the same Adelwolphus decimonono anno regni sui qui totam terram suam ad opus Ecclesiarum decimavit propter Amorem Dei c. More plainly another Authour In eodem anno decimavit Athulf rex de omni possessione sua in partem Domini in universo regimine sui Principatus sic constituit 11. Here we insist not on the many Arguments out of Old and New Testament Store no sore to prove Tithes to be Iure Divino which in due time may be produced when all Tempests of Tumultuous Spirits are allayed and when what the Town-Clerk of Ephesus promised to the Citizens thereof the Question may be determined b Acts 19. 39. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in a lawfull and ordinary Assembly without fear of Force and suspicion of Violence For two Strings to a Bow do not amisse being no Hinderance to the Archer for the better hitting of the Mark who may wind up one and use that for the present which he sees most for his own Conveience Mean time most true it is that men are not so conscientious to obey the Laws of God as fearfull to resist the Edicts of Men and therefore though farre be it from the Clergy to quit their Title to Tithes by Divine Right they conceive it the surest way sometimes to make use of Humane Injunctions as having the most potent Influence on mens Affections especially in this Age when the love of many both to God and Goodnesse beginneth to wax cold 12. A Reverend Doctour in Cambridge A pleasant passage and afterwards Bishop of Sarisbury was troubled at his small living at Hogginton with a peremptory Anabaptist who plainly told him It goes against my Conscience to pay you Tithes except you can shew me a place of Scripture whereby they are due unto you The Doctour returned Why should it not go as much against my Conscience that you should enjoy your Nine parts for which you can shew no place of Scripture To whom the other rejoyned But I have for my Land Deeds and Evidences from my Fathers who purchased and were peaceably possessed thereof by the Laws of the Land The same is my Title saith the Doctour Tithes being confirmed unto me by many Statutes of the Land time out of mind Thus he drave that Nail not which was of the strongest Metall or sharpest Point but which would go best for the present It was Argumentum ad hominem fittest for the person he was to meddle with who afterwards peaceably payed his Tithes unto him Had the Doctour ingaged in Scripture-Argument though never so pregnant pertinent it had been endelesse to dispute with him who made Clamour the end of his Dispute whose Obstinacy and Ignorance made him uncapable
third to the School understand Oxford which he himself had founded the fourth and last to the neighbouring Monasteries round about However we may easily believe that after his Death the Students of Oxford were often at a losse of Livelihood For seeing the Coffers of the greatest Kings especially in the time of War are subject to a Drought of Coin there must needs be a Dearth in those Colledges which are watered thence for their Maintenance Scholars may in time of Peace but Souldiers must be paid in time of War Wherefore the most certain Subsistence for Scholars so far forth as inconstant things as all Sublunary can be made constant is what ariseth from solid Lands wherewith they are endowed For though even such Revenues are subject to Casualties yet some Water will ever be running though the Tide thereof may ebb or flow according to the fall or rise of Commodities 39. But it is hard so to compose two Swarms of Bees in one Hive 14 but that they will fall out 885 and fight Dissention betwixt the Students at Oxford The Colledge of Logick it seems from the Foundation thereof studied Divisions as well as Distinctions there happening a dangerous Difference betwixt the Aborigines and the Advenae the old Stock of Students and the new Store brought in by S t. Grimball the former standing on their Seniority expected more Respect unto themselves deriving their Priviledges from their learned Auncestors time out of mind which the Grimballists would not consent unto Both sides appealed to Alfred as their Patron He coming to Oxford carried himself with much moderation as accounting that Agreement most durable into which the parties were perswaded not commanded Grimball expecting King Alfred's zealous ingaging on his side according to the conceived merits of his Cause Anno Dom. 885 was not a little offended Anno Regis Alfredi seu Aluredi 14 that the King did not appear more resolute in his behalf Insomuch that he forsook Oxford wherein he had formerly built the Church of St. Peter from the very Foundation with stone most curiously wrought and polished and translated both himself and his intended Tombe thence to VVinchester 40. An a Brian Twine in Apolog. Antiq. Oxton Antiquary tells us that the ancient Armes were assigned to Oxford about this time The Armes of oxford namely in a Field Azure a Bible with seven Seales appendant thereunto opened at the beginning of S t. Iohns Gospel In the beginning was the word c. betwixt three Crowns Or which three Crowns saith he signifie the three Senses of the Scripture in the which I confesse I do not understand him For either we must admit but one Sense of the Scripture as principally intended therein which is the generall Opinion of the Protestants or if with the Papists we will allow moe Senses then one we must conclude b Aquinas Summes quae 1. Art 10. four namely the literall allegoricall morall and anagogicall What if the three Crowns import the three Professions which Alfred here sounded and all necessary to the understanding of the Book betwixt them Grammar to understand the Letter Philosophy the Reason and Divinity the Mystery of the Scripture 41. One of the first Scholars of Note One once a swineheard made Bishop of Winchester whom I find bred in Oxford was one Duâ—wolphus once a Swineheard in Athelney when Alfred lurked therein being the Kings Host who entertained him or rather his Master whom the King served Alfred perceiving in him pregnancy of Parts though stifled with the Narrownesse and cripled with the Lownesse of his Vocation sent him to c Godwin in his Bishops of Winchester pag. 263. Oxford where he became after some yeares study Doctour in Divinity and was by the King in Gratitude preferred to be Bishop of d Malmesb. lib. 2. de â—ess Pontificum VVinchester But the Monks of VVinchester are so proud and sullen they disdain to accept this man for their Bishop affirming that their See stood e See M r. Isaak sons Chronology in Caâ—al of Bishops void at this time more willing to confesse a Vacancy then admit a Swineheard into their Episcopall Chaire Whereas surely Alfred so great a Scholar and good a man would not have advanced him per saltum from a Swineheard to a Bishop had he not been qualified by intermediate Degrees of Education For mine own part I see no reason why VVinchester should be ashamed of him and for ought I know 887 Dunwolph might be as good a Bishop as Dunstan 16 of whom the Monks of VVinchester so boast both without cause and measure 42. Councils except Councils of VVarre were very rare in this Age. The preface to the Canons made by King Alfred The f S r. Henry Spelman ' s Counc p. 354. first I find a solemn one celebrated by King Alfred the place not expressed but the Canons therein fairly transmitted to Posterity The Preface of these Canons is very remarkable consisting of three parts 1. The ten Commandments translated into Saxon as being the Basis and Foundation of all Humane Laws 2. Severall pieces of Chapters in Exodus being the Breviate of the Judiciall Law of the Iews which though in the Latitude thereof calculated only for the Iewish Common-wealth yet the Morall Equity therein obligeth all Christians 3. The fifteenth Chapter of the Acts containing the Council of Ierusalem as being a Divine Precedent or Warrant for Christians to convene together and conclude Orders for regulating mens Conversations It is remarkable that in the aforesaid ten Commandments as â—xemplified in this Council of Alfred the second Commandment is wholly â—xpunged Image-worship beginning then to grow common in the world and the Clergy who gained thereby hating the second Commandement on the same account as Ahab did a 1 King 22. 8 Micâ—iah Anno Regis Alfredi seu Aluredi 16 because it ever prophesied evill unto themâ— dashed it out of the Decalogue Anno Dom. 887 The worst is when this was wanting the Decalogue was but an Ennealogue and therefore to preserve the number of ten the Papists generally cleave the last Commandment into two but in Alfred's Preface this is made the tenth and last Commandment Thou shalt not worship Gods of Gold and Silver Which as it comes in out of it's proper place and why should not Gods Order be observed as well as his Number in the Commandments so is it defectively rendered nothing so full against graven-Images as God propounded it The Canons made in this Council fall under a three-fold Consideration Some relate onely to the Common-wealth and by us may properly be forborn Others concern onely Monks and Friers a sixth Finger and no necessary Member of the Church and as Actio moritur cum persona so with the Extirpation of those Convents those Canons may seem to expire 43. Plegmund an Eremite in the Isle of Chester now called Plegmundsham Tutour to King Alfred 18
or measure No author need to be alledged for the avouching thereof the thing being author for it self being so notoriously known and generally believed Others make him to quit his title by Conquest and hold the Crown partly by Bequest from King Edward the Confessor whose good laws he is said to confirm Leges boni Regis Edvardi quas Gulielmus bastardus postea e See Mr Selden ut suprd confirmavit and partly by compact with his people Yea the Chronicles of Lichfield make him to call a Parliament in effect I mean a Meeting of his Clergie and Nobility in a great Councel where as if he had turn'd perfect English-man he conformed his practice to their ancient constitutions 14. Should I interpose between these opposite parties to reconcile them Our endeavours to compass the difference probably the blows from both sides would fall heavy on my charitable indiscretion Yet thus far I will be bold to say such confirmation of King Edward's law if made by King William probably was rather oral and verbal then real and effectual But if real certainly it was not general but limited to some particular place as the Province of Kent the English land of Goshen which alone enjoyed the light of liberty though rather gotten by them then given unto them But if any will contend that this confirmation was general they must confess it done in the later end of his Reign King William when yong lov'd honor when old ease when yong to conquer when old to enjoy Age will make all to stoop as here it bowed him to a better compliance with his people However this his confirmation of King Edward's Laws was not such as either gave general content to or begat assured confidence in the English perchance because but a personal act and but partially done and no whit obligatory of his posterity This made the English press so importunately though in vain to William Rufus the King's son and successor for a re-confirmation of King Edward's Laws which had been needless as being the same with actum agere or rather dacum petere had the former grant from King William his father been conceived sufficient for their security 15. As for King William's particular bounty to Battle-Abby in Sussex King William his bounty to Battle-Abby which he founded it bare better proportion to the dignity of the giver 15. then to the deserts of the receivers 1081. For besides those priviledges formerly a In the first paragr of this book mentioned he gave it all the land within a league of the site thereof He ordered that no forreiner should be obtruded on their Abbey but in every vacancy one of their own Covent should be elected Abbot thereof except which heavens forbid no fit person should be found therein for that preferment Nor should the Abbot be forced to appear at any Synod or meeting except pleased of himself so to do These and many moe immunities he confirmed to that foundation in such an imperious stile as if therewith he meant to bluster all future Princes and King Henry the eighth among the rest into a perfect obedience unto his commands Especially with that clause in his Charter Nullus Successorum meorum violare praesumat But dead King's Charters though they have tongues to threaten yet have no teeth to bite especially when meeting with an equal after-power to rescind them 16. The more the pitty His hard dealing with the Students at Oxford that such drones lazy Abby-lubbers went away with the honey whilest the industrious Bees were almost starved I mean the Scholars of Oxford For at the coming in of the Conqueror the Students in Vniversity-Colledg formerly founded by King Alfred were maintained by pensions yearly paid them out of the King's Exchequer which provision was then conceived both most honourable as immediately depending on the Crown and less troublesome issuing out in ready coine free from vexatious suits casualties of Tenants and other incumbrances But now King William who loved that the tide of wealth should flow into but not ebb out of his coffers detained and denied their b Ex monumentis Gollegii Vniversitatis exhibitions Yea the King pick'd a quarrel with them because they sought to preserve and propagate the English tongue which the King designed to suppress and to reduce all to the French Language And yet the French speech was so far from final prevailing in this Kingdom that it was fain at last to come to a composition with the English tongue mixed together as they remain at this day Save that in termes of Law Venarie and Blazon the French seemeth foly to command The Scholars thus deprived of their pensions liv'd on the charity of c Br. Twine in Antiq Academ Oxon. pag. 215. such as lov'd the continuance of their native tongue Their Latin was then maintained by their English though surely it was no small disturbance to their studies meerly to depend for their subsistence on the arbitrary alms of others 17. Pass we now from King William unto Lanckfranck Arch-Bishop of Canterbury Lanckfranck most kindley treated by the Pope next the King then the most considerable person in our Ecclesiastical History To Rome he went with Thomas elect of York and Remigius of Lincoln all three for confirmation from the Pope in their preferment Pope Alexander treated Lanckfranck so civilly that a stranger if beholding the passages betwixt them haply might have mistook Lanckfranck for the Pope and the Pope for the Petitioner His Highness honoured him as his Master cujus studio sumus in illis quae scimus imbuti by whose care said he we have been instructed in those things whereof we have knowledg 18. Then Lanckfranck charged Thomas in the presence of the Pope His charge against Thomas elect of York as canonically uncapable of that Arch-Bishoprick because the son of a Priest And yet by Lanckfrancks leave no Canon can be produced then in force to debar Priests sons from preferment though some few years after in the Councel of Clermont such a prohibition was made And therefore a Novorum lib. 1. pag. 7. Eadmerus speaking of Lanckfranck calumniatus est Thomam coram Papâ in the proper acception of his words speaks more truth then he was aware of or probably did intend But Lanckfranck being a Privado to the Popes projects and as well to the intentions as the actions of the Church of Rome might by a Prolepsis antedate this objection against Thomas using it for the present as a rub to retard him which some years after was constituted a legal obstacle to exclude any Priests son from promotion But even when that Canon some years after was made the Pope was not so cruel as thereby fully and finally to exclude all Priests sons from Church dignity but onely to shut them out for a time that they might stand at the door and knock I mean with the chink of their money and at
them a punishment far lighter then the offence did deserve Indeed it is most meet in matters meerly Ecclesiastical touching the Word and Sacraments Clergy-men be onely answerable for their faults to their spiritual superiors as most proper and best able to discern and censure the same And in cases criminal it is unfit that Ministers should be summoned before each proud pettish petulant pragmatical secular under-officer However in such causes to be wholly exempted from civil power is a priviledge which with reason cannot be desired of them nor with justice indulged unto them Sure I am Abiathar though High-Priest was convented before and deposed by Solomon for his practising of treason And S t Paul saith Rom. 13. 1. Let every soul be subject to the higher powers 60. To retrench these enormities of the Clergy 1164. the King called a Parliament at Clarendon 10. near Sarisbury and not in Normandy He incurs the Kings displeasure as Mr Fox will have it intending with the consent of his great Councel to confirm some severe Laws of his Grand-father King Henry the first To these Laws See them at large in Mat. Paris sixteen in number Becket with the rest of the Bishops consented and subscribed them But afterwards recanting his own act Anno Regis Hen. 2 10. renounced the same Anno Dom. 1164 Let not therefore the crime of inconstancy be laid too heavily to the charge of Arch-Bishop Cranmer first subscribing then revoking popish articles presented unto him seeing this his name-sake Thomas and predecessor Becket without any stain to his Saintship retracted his own act upon pretence of better information But so highly was Becket offended with himself for his subscription that in revenge for some moneths he suspended himself from all Divine Service his pride and laziness both before and after suspended him from ever preaching and would not be present thereat Hereafter let none hope for more favour from this Arch-Bishop then their fact may deserve seeing he cannot rationally be expected to be courteous to others who was so severe unto himself The best was in this his suspension the knot was not tied so hard as to hurt him who in case of necessity as he had bound so he could loose himself though for the more state of the matter Pope Alexander * Fox his Mon. see the letter at large pag. 269. himself was pleased solemnly to assoil him from his suspension Mean time Becket both in his suspension and absolution most highly offended King Henry who every day the more was alienated from and incensed against him 61. During Beckets abode about Clarendon The vanity of Beckets path he is reported every morning to have walk'd from his lodging some miles to the Kings Palace Where the ground say they called Beckets path at this day presenteth it self to the eyes of the beholders but most quick-sighted if looking through Popish spectacles with the grass and grain growing thereon in a different hew and colour from the rest A thing having in it more of report then truth yet more of truth then wonder the discolourations of such veins of earth being common in grounds elsewhere which never had the happiness of Becket his feet to go upon them 62. But oh He flieth beyond Sea without the Kings consent If Becket's feet had left but the like impression in all the wayes he went how easie had it been for all mens eyes and particularly for our pen to have track'd him in all his travels Who not long after without the consent of the King took Ship sail'd into Flanders thence travelled into the Southern parts of France thence to Pontiniack thence to Senes abiding seven years in banishment But though he served an apprentiship in exile he learned little humility thereby onely altering his name for his more safety from Becket to Derman but retaining all his old nature remitting nothing of his rigid resolutions 63. Now to avoid idleness How employed in his banishment Becket in his banishment variously employed himself First in making and widening breaches between Henry his native Soveraign 11. and Lewis the French King 1165. Secondly in writing many voluminous a See them exemplified at large in Stapleton De Tribus Thomis letters of expostulation to Princes and Prelates Thirdly in letting flie his heavy excommunications against the English Clergie namely against Roger Arch-Bishop of York Gilbert Foliot Bishop of London a learneder man them himself Joceline Bishop of Sarisbury and others His chief quarrel with them was their adherence to the King and particularly because the Arch-Bishop presumed to Crown Henry the King's Son made joynt-King in the life of his Father a priviledge which Becket claimed as proper to himself alone Fourthly in receiving comfort from and returning it to Pope Alexander at Beneventum in Italy 13. Sameness of affliction bred sympathy of affection betwixt them 1167. both being banished the Pope by Frederick Barbarossa the Emperour for his pride and insolency as our Becket smarted for the same fault from King Henry Here also Becket solemnly resigned his Arch-Bishoprick to the Pope as troubled in conscience that he had formerly took it as illegally from the King and the Pope again restored it to him whereby all scruples in his minde were fully satisfied 64. But afterwards by mediation of friends Is reconciled to the King Becket's reconciliation was wrought and leave given him to return into England However the King still retained his temporals in his hand Anno Dom 1167. on weighty considerations Anno Regis Hen. 2. 13. Namely to show their distinct nature from the spirituals of the Arch-Bishoprick to which alone the Pope could restore him Lay-lands being separable from the same as the favour of secular Princes and Becket's bowed knee must own the Kings bountiful hand before he could receive them Besides it would be a caution for his good behaviour 65. Caelum non animum Returns as obstinate as he went over Travellers change climates 1170. not conditions 16. Witness our Becket stubborn he went over stubborn he staied stubborn he return'd Amongst many things which the King desired and he denied he refused to restore the Excommunicated Bishops pretending he had no power indeed he had no will and that they were Excommunicate by his Holiness Yea he instead of recalling his old added new Excommunications and that thunder which long before rumbled in his threatnings now gave the crack upon all those that detained his temporal revenues a Parte posteriâ—â—i Henrici secundi pag. 521. Roger Hoveden reports that upon Christmas-day the better day the better deed he Excommunicated Robert de Broc because the day before he had cut off one of his horses tailes Yea he continued and encreased his insolence against the King and all his subjects 66. Here the King let fall some discontented words Is slain by four Knights in his own Church which
a By-Foundation of Postmasters in this House a kinde of Colledg in the Colledg and this Tradition goeth of their Original Anciently there was over against Merton Colledg a small un-endowed Hall whose Scholars had so run in arrears that their opposite neighbours out of charity took them into their Colledg then but nine in number to wait on the Fellows But since they are freed from any attendance and endowed with plentiful maintenance M r Willet being the first Benefactor unto them in that nature whose good example hath provoked many to follow his liberality These most justly conceive themselves much honoured in that Bishop Jewel was a postmaster before removed hence to be Fellow of Corpus Christs Colledg We take our farewell of this House when we have told it consisted lately viz. 1635. of one Warden twenty one Fellows fourteen a The same I conceive with the Postmasters Scholars besides Officers and Servants of the foundation with other Students the whole number being eighty 9. Come we now to the Kings retrenching the Popes power The Church ready to eat up the Common-wealth grown so exorbitant in England A principall part whereof consisted in the multitude of Monasteries daylie increasing in wealth and all at the Popes absolute devotion If posterity had continued at this rate to build and endow Religious Houses all England would in short time have turned one entire and continued Monastery and the inhabitants thereof become either Friers or Founders Where then should be any Souldiers to fight the Kings battels Seamen to steer his ships Husbandmen to plough the Kings land or rather any land of his to be ploughed by husbandmen 10. Besides The mischief of Mortmain to the Crown though these Friers had a living-hand to take and receive from any they had Mortmaine a dead-hand to restore and return any profit to the King again Yea such alienation of lands in Mortmaine setled on Monasteries which as Corporations neither married nor died afforded neither Wards Marriages Reliefs nor Knights-service for the defence of the Realm in a word enriched their private coffers impoverished the publick Exchequer It was not therefore such a dead band which could feed so many living mouthes as the King for his state and safety must maintain Wherefore for the future he restrain'd such unlimited Donatives to Religious Houses 11. Ignorance makes many men mistake meer transcripts for Originals This Law not new but renewed So here the short-fighted vulgar sort beheld the Kings Act herein as new strange and unprecedented whereas indeed former times and forein Princes had done the like on the same occasion First we finde some countenance for it in a Exod 36. 6. Scripture when Moses by proclamation bounded the overflowing bounty of the people to the Tabernacle And in the Primitive times Theodosius the Emperor although most loving and favourable to the Clergie made a Law of A Mortisation or Mortmain to moderate peoples bounty to the Church Yet a great Father Jerome by name much disliked this Act as appears by his complaint to Nepotian of that Law I am ashamed to say it the Priests of Idols Stage-players Coach-men and common Harlots are made capable of inheritance and receive Legacies only Ministers of the Gospel and Monkes are barred by Law thus to do and that not by Persecutors but by Christian Princes But that passionate Father comes off well at last neither do I complain of the Law but I am sorry we have deserved to have such a Law made against us 12. b In his 31. Epist S t Ambrose likewise expresseth much anger on the same occasion out of his general zeal for the Churches good Ambrose angry with Mortmaine But had the aforesaid Fathers men rather pious then politick good Church-men no States-men seen the Monasteries swollen in revenues from an inch in their dayes to an ell by peoples fondness yea dotage on the four sorts of Friers in King Edwards Reign they would no doubt instead of reproving have commended his and the neighbouring Kings care for their Common-wealths 13. For the like laws for limiting mens liberality The Statute of Mortmaine were lately made in Spain and France and now at last followed by King Edward according to the tenour ensuing WHere of late it was provided Anno Dom. 1279. that religious men should not enter into the fees of any without licence and will of the chief Lords of whom such fees be holden immediately Anno Regis Ed. 〈◊〉 7. Nov. 4. And notwithstanding such religious men have entered as well into their own sees as in the fees of other men approprying and buying them and sometime receiving them of the gift of others whereby the services that are due of such fees and which at the beginginning were provided for defence of the Realme are wrongfully without own and the chief Lords do leese their Escheats of the same we therefore to the profit of our Realm intending to provide convenient remedy by the advice of our Prelates Earls Barons and other our subjects being of our Councel have provided made and ordained That no person Religious or other whatsoever he be that will buy or sell any Lands or Tenements or under the colour of Gift or Lease or that will receive by reason of any other title whatsoever it be Lands or Tenements or by any other Craft or Engine will presume to appropriat to himself under pain of forfeiture of the same whereby such Lands or Tenements may any wise come into Mortmaine We have provided also That if any person religious or other do presume either by Craft or Engine to offend against this Statute it shall be lawful to us and other chief Lords of the Fee immediately to enter in the land so aliened within a year from the time of their alienation and to hold it in fee and as Inheritance And if the chief Lord immediately be negligent and will not enter into such Fee within the year then it shall be lawful to the next chief Lord immediate of the same Fee to enter in the said land within half a year next following and to hold it as before is said and so every Lord immediate may enter into such Land if the next Lord be negligent in entering into the same Fee as is aforesaid And if all the chief Lords of such Fees being of full age within the four Seas and out of prison be negligent or slack in this behalf we immediately after the year accomplished from the time that such purchases Gifts or Appropriations hap to be made shall take such tenements into our hand and shall enfeoffe others therein by certain Services to be done to Us for the defence of our Realm saving to the chief Lords of the same Fees their Wardes and Escheats and other Services thereunto due and accustomed And therefore we command you that ye cause the foresaid Statute to be read before you and from henceforth to be kept firmly and observed
long since should have sent him namely to visit his Diocess so large in extent and reside therein 3. Indifferent men thought that he had enough 〈…〉 his Foes that too much onely himself that too little was left unto him Pride accounts the greatest plenty if without Pomp no better then Penury Yet he had the whole revenues of York Arch-Bishoprick worth then little less then four thousand pounds yearly besides a large Pension paid him out of the Bishoprick of Winchester Was not here suel enough had thee not been too much fire within such his covetousness and ambition 4. Earthly Kings may make men humbled He states it at York God alone humble Wolsey began to state it at York as high as ever before in proportion to his contracted revenues Preparation is made in a Princely equipage for his Installation attracting envie from such as beheld it All is told unto the King and all made worse by telling it complaining Wolsey would never leave his pride till life first left him His old faults are revived and aggravated and the King incensed afresh against him 5. The Earl of Northumberland by the Commission from the King Arrested of Treason and dieth Arrested him of high-Treason in his own chamber at Cawood By slow and short journeys he setteth forward to London meeting by the way with contrary messages from the King Sometimes he was tickled with hopes of pardon and preserment sometimes pinched with fears of a disgraceful death so that he knew not how to dispose his minde to Mirth or Mourning Age and anguish brought his disease of the dysentery the pain lying much in his guts more in his heart Especially aftger S r William Kingston was sent unto him who being Lieutenant of the Tower seemed to carry a restraint in his looks Coming to Leicester he died being buried almost as obscurely as he was born 6. I know not whether or no it be worth the mentioning here Wolseys credulity befooled with dubious Prophecy however we will put it on the adventure that Cardinal Wolsey in his life time was inform'd by some Fortune-tellers that he should have his end at Kingston This his credulity interpreted of Kingston on Thames which made him alwayes to avoid the riding through that Town though the nearest way from his house to the Court. Afterwards understanding that he was to be committed by the Kings express order to the charge of S r Anthony Hen. Lord Howard in his Book against Prophesies chap. 28. fol. 130. Kingston it struck to his heart too late perceiving himself deluded by that Father of Lies in his homonymous prediction 7. Anna Bollen did every day look fairer and fiarer in the King's eyes The King deluded with delays at Rome whilest the hopes of his marriage with her seemed every day farther and farther from him For the Court at Rome meddled not with the merits of the causse but fell upon by-points therein of lesser concernment Yea they divided his case into three a Hist of Councel of Trent pag. 69. and twenty particulars whereof the first was Whether Prince Arthur had carnal knowledg with the Lady Katharine This bare about a years debate so that according to this proportion King Henry would be not onely past marrying but past living before his cause should be decided This news put him into a passionate pensiveness the rather because meeting with sadness here many populous places in England and Cambridg particularly being at the present visited with the sickness 8. But it is an evil plague which brings no body profit On this occasion D r Cranmer retired to Waltham with two of his Pupils Doct. cranmet comes to Waltham the sons of M r Cressey a name utterly extinct in that Town where God hath fixed my present habitation long before the memory of any alive But consulting Weavers a In Essex Pag. 645. But see the former part of Cranmers life until this time in our History of Cambridg Funeral-Monuments of Waltham-Church more truly then nearly by him composed I finde therein this Epitaph Here lyeth Jon and Jone Cressy On whose soulys Jesu havmercy Amen It seems paper sometimes in more lasting then brass all the ancient Epitaphs in that Church being defac'd by some barbarous hands who perchance one day may want a grave for themselves 9. The King coming to Waltham Is imployed by the King to the Pope D r Fox his Chaplain and Almoner afterwards Bishop of Hereford is lodged in M r Cressy 's house Discoursing about the Kings Divorce Cranmer conceived that the speediest course was to prove the unlawfulness of his Match by Scripture whence it would follow that the Pope at first had no power to dispence therewith and that the Vniversities of Christendom would sooner and truer decide the case then the Court of Rome This passage Fox reports to the King who well pleased thereat professes that this man had the b Fox Acts Mon. 1861. Sow by the right ear An ear which the King never left worrying till he had got it off and effected his will therein Cranmer being sent for comes to the King who very lovingly entertains him Indeed he was a most comely person having an amiable eye and as the soul sees much by the eye so is it much seen in them and pleasing countenance as by his lively c Which I have seen at Chesthunt in the house of Sir Tho. Docres done as I take it by Hans Holbein Picture doth appear Glad was the King to see more to hear him enlarge himself on the former subject that it was above the Popes power to dispense with Gods work in the Kings case And now what fitter Nurse for the Childe then the own Mother what person more proper to manage this matter then Cranmer himself who first moved it The King resolves and Cranmer consents he should be sent to the Pope there to make God his possition Leave we Cranmer for a time preparing himself for his long journey and come briefly to state the Kings Controversie out of Gods Word and several Authors who have written thereof 10. It plainly appears that a marriage with a Brothers wife is unlawful Marriage with Brothers Wives twice forbidden in Scripture because expresly forbidden LEVIT 18. 16 Thou shalt not uncover the Nakedness of thy Brothers Wife it is thy Brothers Nakedness Wherein we have 1. A Prohibition Thou shalt not uncover the Nakedness of thy Brothers Wife See all these Laws are made to men it being presumed that the weaker sex whose part it is to take not tender accept not offer love would be so modest as not to adventure of themselves on any incestuous act except first solicited by men thereunto 2. The Reason thereof It is thy Brothers Nakedness God could according to his Dominion peremptorily have forbidden the same without rendring a reason of his Prohibition but that men might pay the more willing obedience to his Law
Lincoln John Exeter 24. Mar. 30. Henry S t Asaph 1533 and none that pretendeth to skill in Canon Law can deny the number insufficient for such a performance 30. Another urgeth him uncapable of a Bishoprick as debarr'd by Bigamy His double marriage no ba◠unto him even by the censure of the c 1 Tim. 3. 2. Apostle Let a Bishop be the husband of one wife Cranmer being successively twice married It is Answered such successive marriage is no Bigamy the Apostle onely forbidding the having of many wives at once a fault fashionable amongst the Jews then and many years after by the testimony of d In dial cum Tryph. Justine Martyr and the same is so expounded also by e Eph. 83. S Hierom. praecipit ut sacerdotes singulas uno tempore habeant uxores 31. But grant Cranmer guilty but of one wife at once Bishops married in the Primitive times even that made him as his adversaries rejoyn uncapable of the Arch-Bishoprick because Prohibited by the Canons To which we answer that f Sozomenus lib. 1. cap. 11. Spiridion g Baptistae Mantuenus S t. Hilary h In carmine de vitâ suâ Gregory Nazianzen and many other Bishops eminent for Learning and Sanctity in the Primitive times are confessed married men by authentick Authors in the best times accounted no bar to their Episcopal function Yea the Romanists are concerned to allow Cranmer a lawful Arch-Bishop because allowing such as were Consecrated by him as Thomas Thyrlby Bishop of Ely Anthony Kitchin Bishop of Landaff for lawful Bishops to whom he could not derive any orders if not legally invested therein himself 32. Pass we now to such acceptions which a m Will Pryn in his antipathy of prelacy to Monarchie pag. 131. Modern writer zealous against Popery taketh against him Cranmer took not the like Oath with his predecessors being no fewer then nine as if he intended what they want in weight to make up in number 1. That he took the like Oath to the Pope which his Predecessors have done and therefore was deeply charged of perjury by Martin a Papist * The copy of his protestation 33. I Answer he took not the like Oath His Predecessours took it absolutely and simply Not so Cranmer Not that he was guilty of any clandestine equivocation or mental reservation therein but publickly entred a solemn Protestation remaining on Record in his n Ex Regist. Cranmer fol. 4. office in manner and form following IN Dei nomine Amen Coram nobis c. Non est nec erit meae voluntatis aut intentionis per hujusmodi juramentum vel juramenta qualiterque verba in ipsis posita sonare videbuntur me obligare ad aliquid ratione eorundem posthac dicendum faciendum aut attentandum quid erit aut esse videbitur contra legem Dei vel contra illustrissimum Regem nostrum Angliae aut Rempublicam hujus sui Regni Angliae legesve aut praerogativa ejusdem quòd non intendo per hujusmodi juramentum vel juramenta quovis modo me obligare quo minùs liberè loqui consulere consentire valeam in omnibus singulis reformationem Religionis Christianae gubernationem Ecclesiae Anglicanae ac praerogativam coronae ejusdem Reipublicae vè commoditatem quoquo modo concernentibus ea ubique exequi reformare quae mihi in Ecclesiâ Anglicanâ reformanda videbuntur Anno Dom. 1533 secundum hanc interpretationem Anno Regis Hen. 8. 24. intellectum hunc non aliter neque alio modo dictum juramentum me praestiturum protestor profiteor c. This Protestation he did not privately smother in a corner but publickly interposed it three several times viz. once in the Chapter-house before authentick witnesses again on his bended knees at the High-Altar many people and Bishops beholding him when he was to be consecrated and the third time when he received his Pall in the same place 34. Secondly No cavil but a just charge he accuseth him for having a hand in the condemnation and execution of Lambert Frith and other Godly Martyrs This indeed cannot be denied For though I am loath that Cranmers head should by the weight and violence of his causless detractors be plucked under water where he was innocent I will leave him to sink or swim by himself where he was guilty Onely adding In many things we offend all 35. His third accusation A happy match in the event he was a chief man in accomplishing King Henries Divorce which a Mr Pryn pag. 132. occasioned much trouble dissention and war But he might have remembred which also produced the peerless Princess Queen Elizabeth who perfected the Reformation and by her long peaceable and victorious Reign brought much honour wealth and renown to our Nation Besides that Divorce is generally defended by Protestant writers whose judgments this accuser will rely on when it makes for his purpose 36. Fourth accusation A Rebels weapon the Lincoln-shire Rebels in their six Articles of their grievances presented to King Heary the eighth complain that this Arch-Bishop and other Prelates of his Graces late promotion had b Mr Pryn ut prius subverted the Faith of Christ c. 37. I Answer Ill used against a loyal subject they were the Lincoln-shire Rebels that said it and this their pretended subverting of the sath was the reforming and confirming thereof Cranmer serving the God of his Fathers in that way which they termed Heresie Welltherefore might this cavil have been waved good onely to swell the Volume 38. Fifth Cavil The grand cavil though Matthew Parker reports as this c Mr Pryn pag. 133. Delator confesses that Cranmer opposed this act of the six Articles at first then caused it to be moderated and at last to be repealed in King Edwards dayes but others seem to imply that he gave consent thereunto at first 39. To this I Answer three things Answered First to imply is far less then to express and such implications are often the bare surmises of a byassed apprehension Secondly to seem to imply is less then to imply nulla videntur quae non sunt Thirdly the Others by him mentioned ought to have been nominated this Author generally giving no scant measure in such wares so that his margin commonly over-thronged is here quite empty of quotations Inopem nunc copia secit We may assure our selves he would have alledged such Other Authors but for several substantial reasons whereof this was one because he had none to alledg And shall an uncertain un-named No body be believed against Cranmer before M r Fox and D r Parkers clear testimonies in his behalf 40. Seventh Cavil Violent no just depriving He suffered Martyrdome not while he was a Bishop but when degraded and deprived What of this does this tend any thing to the disgrace of him or his order seeing such
manner of speaking as the Articles of our Faith be already conceived and expressed in the said Creeds without altering in any wise or varying from the same Item That they ought and must utterly refuse and condemn all those opinions contrary to the said Articles which were of long time passed condemned in the four holy Councels that is to say in the Councel of Nice Constantinople Ephesus and Calcedon and all other since that time in any point consonant to the same The Sacrament of Baptism Secondly As touching the holy Sacrament of Baptism We will that all Bishops and Preachers shall instruct and teach Our people committed by Us unto their spiritual charge that they ought and must of necessity believe certainly all those things which have been alwaies by the whole consent of the Church approved received and used in the Sacrament of Baptism that is to say that the Sacrament of Baptism was instituted and ordained in the New Testament by our Saviour JESUS CHRIST as a thing necessary for the attaining of everlasting life according to the saying of Christ d d Iohn 3. 5. No man can enter into the kingdome of heaven except he be born again of water and the Holy Ghost Item That is offered unto all men as well Infants as such as have the use of reason that by Baptism they shall have remission of sins and the grace and favour of God according to the saying of Christ e e Mark 16. 16. Whosesoever believeth and is baptized shall be saved Item That the promise of grace everlasting life which promise is adjoyned unto this Sacrament of Baptism pertaineth not onely unto such as have the use of reason but also to infants innocents and children and that they ought therefore and must needs be baptized and that by the Sacrament of Baptism they do also obtain remission of their sins the grace and favour of God and he made thereby the very sons and children of God Insomuch as infants and children dying in their infancy shall undoubtedly be saved thereby and else not Item That infants must needs be christened because they be born in original sin which sin must needs be remitted which cannot be done but by the Sacrament of Baptism whereby they receive the Holy Ghost which exerciseth his grace and efficacy in them and cleanseth and purifieth them from sin by his most secret virtue and operation Item That children or men once baptized can ne ought ever to be baptized again Item That they ought to repute and take all the Anabatists and the Pelagians their opinions contrary to the premisses and every other man's opinion agreeable unto the said Anabaptists or Pelagians opinions in this behalf for detestable heresies and utterly to be condemned Item That men or children having the use of reason and willing and desiring to be baptized shall by the vertue of that Holy Sacrament obtain the grace and remission of all their sins if they shall come thereunto perfectly and truly repentant and contriâ—e of all their sins before committed and also perfectly and constantly confessing and believing all the Articles of our Faith according as it was mentioned in the first Article And finally If they shall also have firm credence and trust in the promise of God adjoyned to the said Sacrament that is to say that in and by this said Sacrament which they shall receive God the Father giveth unto them for his son Jesus Christ's sake remission of all their sins and the grace of the Holy Ghost whereby they be newly regenerated and made the very children of God according to the saying of S. John and the Apostle S. Peter f f Acts 2. 38. Doe penance for your sins and be each of you baptized in the name of Jesu Christ and you shall obtain remission of your sins and shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost And according also to the saying of S. Paul g g Tit. 3. 5. God hath not saved us for the works of justice which we have done but of his mercy by baptism and renovations of the Holy Ghost Whom he hath powred out upon us most plentifully for the love of Jesu Christ our Saviour to the intent that we being justified by his grace should be made the inheritours of everlasting life according to our hope The Sacrament of Penance Thirdly concerning the Sacrament of Penance We will that all Bishops and Preachers shall instruct and reach Our people committed by Us unto their spiritual charge that they ought and must constantly believe that that Sacrament was institute of Christ in the New Testament as a thing so necessary for man's salvation that no man which after his baptisme is fallen again and hath committed deadly sin can without the same be saved or attain everlasting life Item That like as such men which after Baptism doe fall again into sin it they doe not penance in this life shall undoubtedly be damned even so whensoever the same men shall convert themselves from their naughty life and doe such penance for the same as Christ requireth of them they shall without doubt attain remission of their sins and shall be saved Item That the Sacrament of perfect Penance which Christ requireth of such manner persons consisteth of three parties that is to say Contritrition Confession and the Amendment of the former life and a new obedient reconciliation unto the laws and will of God that is to say exteriour acts in works of charity according as they be commanded of God which be called in Scripture b b Luke 3. 8. The worthy fruits of penance Furthermore As touching Contrition which is the first part We will that all Bishops and Preachers shall instruct and teach Our people committed by Us unto their spirtiual charge that the said Contrition consisteth in two special parts which must alwaies be conjoyned together and cannot be dissevered that is to say The penitent and contrite man must first knowledge the filthiness and abomination of his own sin unto which knowledge he is brought by hearing and considering of the will of God declared in his laws and feeling and perceiving in his own conscience that God is angry and displeased with him for the same He must also conceive not onely great sorrow and inward shame that he hath so grievously offended God but also great fear of Gods displeasure towards him considering he hath no works or merits of his own which he may worthily lay before God as sufficient satisfaction for his sins Which done then afterward with this fear shame and sorrow must needs succeed and be conjoyned the second part that is to wit a certain faith trust and confidence of the mercy and goodnesse of God whereby the penitent must conveive certain hope and faith that God will forgive him his sins and repute him justified and of the number of his elect children not for the worthinesse of any merit or work done by the penitent but for the onely
his plain Prayer which he immediately after made His Prayer whereby his Speech may be interpreted too long here to insert but set down at large in Mr. Fox and which speaketh him a true Protestant And if negative Arguments avail ought in this matter no superstitious crossing of himself no praying to Saints no desiring of prayers for him after his death c. may evidence him no Papist in the close of his life Indeed Anti-Cromwellists count this controversie of the Religion he died in not worth the deciding no Papists conceiving the gain great to get him on their side and some Protestants accounting the losse as little to part with him However this right ought to be done to his Memory in fixing it on its own principles and not mis-representing the same to posterity 28. Remarkable is that passage in his Speech Heaven is just in Barths injustice wherein he confesseth himself by Law condemned to die because a story dependeth thereupon Not long agoe an Act had passed in Parliament That one might be attainted of Treason by Bill in Parliament and consequently lose his life without any other legal triall or being ever brought to answer in his own defence The Lord Cromwell was very active in procuring this Law to passe insomuch that it is generally believed that the Arme and Hammer of all King Henry's Power could never have driven on this Act thorough both Houses had not Cromwell first wimbled an hole for the entrance thereof and politickly prepared a major part of Lords and Commons to accept the same For indeed otherwise it was accounted a Law injurious to the liberty which reason alloweth to all persons accused and which might cut out the tongue of Innocency it self depriving her of pleading in her own behalf Now behold the hand of Heaven It hapned that this Lord first felt the smart of this rod which be made for others and was accordingly condemned before ever he was heard to speak for himself Nec lex est justior ulla Quam necis artifices arte perire suâ Most just it is that they bad Laws who make Should themselves first of their own Laws partake Thus those who break down the banks and let in the stream of Arbitrary power be it into the hands of Prince or People are commonly the first themselves which without pity are drowned in the deluge thereof 29. Thus farre I have swome along with the winde and tide of all our English Historians Yet the Lord Cromwell by a great person acquitted herein in charging of Cromwell herein But I finde one * Sir Edward Coke Part 4. of Institut in Jurisdiction of Courts p. 37. Authour of strong credit such he needs to be who swims against the stream acquitting the said Lord deriving his intelligence from Sir Thomas Gawdie a grave Judge then living who acquainted him as followeth King Henry commanded the L. Cromwell to attend the Chief Justices and to know whether a man that was forth-coming might be attainted of high Treason by Parliament and never called to his answer The Judges answered That it was a dangerous question and that the high Court of Parliament ought to give examples to inferiour Courts for proceeding according to justice and no inferiour Court could doe the like and they thought the high Court of Parliament would never doe it But being by the expresse commandement of the King and pressed by the said Earl to give a direct answer they said That if he be attainted by Parliament it could not come in question afterwards whether he was called or not called to answer and the Act of Attainder being passed by Parliament did binde as they resolved The party against whom this was intended was never called in question but the first man after the said resolution that was so attainted and never called to answer was the said Earl of Essex whereupon that erroneous and vulgar opinion amongst our Historians grew That he died by the same Law which he himself had made 30. But His exemplary gratitude grant this Lord Cromwell faulty in this and some other actions in the main he will appear a worthy person and a great instrument of God's glory in the reforming of Religion and remarkable for many personal eminencies Commonly when men are as in a moment mounted from meannesse to much wealth and honour first they forget them selves and then all their old friends and acquaintance Whereas on the contrary here gratitude grew with his greatnesse and the Lord Cromwell conferred many a courtesie on the Children from whose Fathers Master Cromwell had formerly received favours As he was a good Servant to his Master so was he a good Master to his Servants and fore-seeing his own full which he might have foretold without the Spirit of Prophesie some half a year before he furnished his Men which had no other lively-hood to subsist by with Leases Pensions and Annuities whereby after his death they had a comfortable maintenance 31. One so faithfull to his Servants His care for his Children cannot be suspected for an Infidel in not providing for his family of his own children It was not therefore his ambition but providence that on the same day wherein he was created Earle of Essex he procured Gregory his Son which otherwise had been then but a Lord by courtesie to be actually made Baron Cromwell of Oke-ham Which honour because inherent in the Son was not forfeited on his Father's attainture but descends at this day on his Posterity 32. We will conclude his story with this remarkable instance of his humility An eminent instance of his humility Formerly there flourished a notable family of the b Camdens Brit. in Lincoln-shire Cromwells at Tattershall in Lincoln-shire especially since Sir Ralph Cromwell married the younger Sister and Coheir of William the last Lord Deincourt Now there wanted not some flattering Heraults excellent Chemists in Pedegrees to extract any thing from any thing who would have entituled this Lord Cromwell to the Armes of that antient Family extinct in the issue male thereof about the end of King Henry the sixt His answer unto them was That he would not weare another mans coat for fear the right owner thereof should pluck it off over his ears and preferred rather to take a new coate viz. * See Vincent in the Earles of Essex AZure Or a Fess inter three Lyons rampant Or a Rose Gules betwixt two Chaughes proper being somewhat of the fullest the Epidemical dissease of all Armes given in the Reign of Henry the eighth 33. After the execution of the Lord Cromwell Men of different judgment meeting at their death the Parliament still sitting a motly execution happened in Smithfield three Papists hanged by the Statute for denying the King's supremacy and as many Protestants burnt at the same time and place by vertue of the six Articles dying with more pain and no lesse patience Papists Protestants Edward Powell
His Graces late promotion had Subverted the Faith of CHRIST as they thought which is the Archbishop of Canterbury the Bishops of Rochester Salisbury S. Davids and Dublin 3. This Lincoln shire Commotion being quickly suppressed and a right understanding begotten betwixt the King and His Subjects the Rebellious humour removed into Yorkâ—shire where no fewer than fifty thousand saith Sanders were assembled in a body under Robert Aske a mean Gentleman their Captain and one Diamond though a knave of another suit who termed himself the Earl of Poverty yet this distemper also was seasonably cured by the King's pardon and their submission till soon after a great part of them fell into a relapse of Rebellion carrying in their Ensignes the five wounds of our Saviour the Chalice wiâ—h the Hoste and the Name of JESUS betwixt them who being vanquished by the King's forces under the command of the Earle of Shrewesbury were condignely executed for the same 4. Indeed Sanders Excused by Sanders unjustly to whom it is as naturall to defame as for a stone to descend complaineth That the King executed those whom formerly He had pardoned for the same offence contrary to Gods proceedings with whom peccata remissa non recurrunt yea contrary to equity and all common justice but our Chronicles make it plain that they ran on the score of a new Rebellion their faults specifically not numerically the same and justly suffered for their offences therein 5. Thomas Lord Darcy and the Lord Hussey first and last Baron of his Family were beheaded on this account The first of these being much bemoaned both for what he had been a marshall man of merit by sea and land and for what he was decaied being almost eighty with old age insomuch that there goeth a Tradition that he had the King's Pardon in his pocket and slept the while the sentence of condemnation was passed on him and then produced it too late such it seems were the rigorous proceedings against him Ask and Diamond were executed in this Rebellion Persons executed and so also were six Abbots namely of Sanley Barling Gerviaus Whaley Rivers with the Prior of Berlington besides many Gentlemen of prime account whereof these the chief Robert Constable Thomas Piercy Francis Bigot Nicholas Musgrave Nicholas Temple Stephen Hamilton Thomas Gilby William Lomley John Bulmar and his Wife However some pity may seem proper to these persons as ignorantly zealous and grieved to behold the destruction of the old Religion before they had received any competent instruction for a new And thus was there a rout of the most antient of the Northern Gentlemen of the Romish perswasion who in the next Generation had scarcely rallied themselves again but they were routed the second time in the Rebellion of the Earls of Northuâ—berland and Westmerland The return of the Visitors of Abbeys BY this time the Instruments imployed by the Lord Cromwell The return of the L. Cromwells agents to make discovery of the vitious lives of Monks and Fryers were all returned in their persons or in their intelligence sent unto him They were men who well understood the Message they went on and would not come back without a satisfactory answer to him that sent them knowing themselves were likely to be no losers thereby And now they had sound out water enough to drive the mill besides what ran by a sufficient detection to effect the businesse Of these some were put in Commission to visit Abbeys others moving in a lower but no lesse needful sphere of activity 2. Of these Commissioners the principal were Rich Layton The principall Commissioners The Legh William Peters Doctors of the Law a L. Herbert in the Life of Hen. 8. p 398. Doctor John London Dean of Wallingford Of the three former I can say nothing but finde the later though imployed to còrrect others no great Saint himself For afterwards he was publickly b Fex Acts Mon p. 1221 where is a picture thereof Their two-edged sword convicted of perjury and adjudged to ride with his face to the Horse-tale at Windosor and Ockingham with papers about his head which was done accordingly 3. Their power was partly Inquisitive to search into the former lives of religious persons partly Impositive to enjoyn them stricter rules for their future observation It is hard to say whether their eyes were more prying for what was past or hands more heavy for the time to come and most true it is that betwixt both many Monks formerly lazie in were now weary of their present profession 4. Some counted their Convents Monks weâ—ry of their lives their Prisons being thus confined for once out of the house without lawful cause and leave obtained and never in again It was a fine thing when they might but sad case when they must live in their Monasteries the Eighty six Articles of the Visitors looking with Janus partly backward partly forward did so vex them that many who had hopes of others subsistence cast off the Couls and Vails and quitted their Convents The second sort of insinuating Emissaries THese Visitors were succeeded with a second sort of publick Agents Others undone by their own dissentions but working in a more private way encouraging the members in Monasteries to impeach one another for seeing there was seldome such general agreement in any great Convent but that factions were found and parties did appear therein these Emissaries made an advantageous use thereof No Abbey could have been so soon destroyed but by cunning setting it against it self and secret fomenting of their own divisions Whereupon many being accused did recriminate their Accusers and hopelesse to recover their own innocency pleased themselves by plunging others in the like guiltinesse Others being conscious to themselves prevented accusing by confessing their faults and those very foul ones Insomuch that some have so much charity as to conceive that they made themselves worse than they were though it was a needlesse work for a Black-Moore to besoot his own face 2. Yea A charitable censure some hold that as Witches long-tortured with watching and fasting and pinched when but ready to nod are contented causlessly to accuse themselves to be eased of the present pain so some of these poor souls frighted with menaces and fearing what might be the successe acknowledged all and more than all against themselves the truth whereof none on earth can decide Soliciting and tempting Emissaries complained of by the Papists THe Papists doe heavily complain how justly God alone knoweth that a third sort of Agents were imployed A devilish design if true to practise on the chastity of the Nuns so to surprize them into wantonness Some young Gallants were on disigne sent to some Covents with fair faces flattering tongues store of gold and good cloathes youth wit wantonness and what else might work on the weaker sex These having with much craft scrued themselves into the affections of Nuns and brought them to
antient amongst the Barons to the degree and dignity of Viscounts wherein that it may long flourish in plenty and happinesse is the daily prayer of Your Honours most obliged Servant THOMAS FVLLER THE Church-History OF BRITAIN KING HENRY the eighth Jan. 28. though dying excommunicate in the Church of Rome The hopefull beginning of King Edward had notwithstanding His Obsequies solemnly performed at Paris in France 1546. 7. by the command of Francis the French a Godwin in Edvardo â—exto pag. 158. King presuming so much on His own power and the Pope's patience otherwise such courtesie to His friend might have cost Him a curse to Himself Then began King Edward His Son Ann. Reg. Ed. 6. 1. to reign scarce ten years old Ann. Dom. full of as much worth as the model of His age could hold No pen passeth by Him without praising Him though none praising Him to His full deserts Yea Sanders himself having the stinch of his railing tongue over-sented with the fragrant ointment of this Prince's memory though jeering His for His want of age which was God's pleasure and not King Edward's fault and mocking Him for His Religion the others highest honour alloweth Him in other respects large commendations 2. No sooner was He come to the Crown Peace and prosperity to the Protestants in England but a peaceable dew refreshed Gods inheritance in England formerly patched with persecution and this good Angel struck off the fetters from many Peters in prison preserving those who were appointed to die Onely Thomas Dobbie Fellow of S. Johns in Cambridge committed to the Counter in Bread street and condemned for speaking against the Masse died of a natural death in respect of any publick punishment by Law inflicted on him but whether or no any private impression of violence hastened his end God alone knoweth His speedy death prevented the b Fox Acts Mon. Vol. 2. pag. 655. pardon which the Lord Protectour intended to send him Divine Providence so ordering it that he should touch not enter see not taste behold not reap benefit on earth of this Reformation Other Confessours which had fled beyond sea as John Hooper Miles c Senders de Schis Anglic. lib. 2. pag. 230. Coverdale c. returned with joy into their Countrey and all Protestants which formerly for fear had dissembled their religion now publickly professed the same Of these Archbishop Cranmer was the chiefest who though willingly he had done no ill and privately many good offices for the Protestants yet his cowardly compliance hitherto with Poperie against his conscience cannot not be excused Ann. Dom. 1546-47 serving the times present in his practice Ann Reg. Ed. 6 1. and waiting on a future alteration in his hopes and desires 3. Edward Semaure Commissionners sent into several Counties with Instructions to reform the King's Uncle lately made Lord Protectour Jan. 28. and Duke of Somerset ordered all in Church and State He by the King's power or if you please the King in his protection took speedy order for Reformation of Religion And being loth that the people of the Land should live so long in errour and ignorance till a Parliament should be solemnly summoned which for some Reasons of State could not so quickly be call'd in the mean time by His own Regall power and authority and the advise of His wise and honourable Counsell chose Commissioners and sent them with Instructions into severall parts of the Kingdome for the rooting out of superstition the substance whereof thirty six in number we have here presented The King's Injunctions 1. That all Ecclesiasticall persons observe the Lawes for the abolishing the pretended and usurped power of the Bishop of Rome and confirmation of the Kings authority and supremacie 2. That once a Quarter at least they sincerely declare the Word of God disswading their people from superstitious fancies of Pilgrimages praying to Images c. exhorting them to the works of faith mercy and charitie 3. That Images abused with Pilgrimages and offerings thereunto be forthwith taken down and destroyed and that no more wax-Candles or Tapers be burnt before any Image but onely two lights upon the high Altar before the Sacrament shall remain still to signifie that Christ is the very light of the world 4. That every Holy day when they have no Sermon the Pater noster Credo and Ten Commandements shall be plainly recited in the Pulpit to the Parishioners 5. That Parents and Masters bestow their Children and Servants either to learning or some honest occupation 6. That such who in Cases exprest in the Statute are absent from their Benefices leave learned and expert Curates 7. That within three Months after this Visitation the Bible of the larger volume in English and within twelve Months Erasmus his Paraphrase on the Gospel be provided and conveniently placed in the Church for people to read therein 8. That no Ecclesiasticall persons haunt Ale-houses or Taverns or any place of unlawfull gameing 9. That they examine such who come to confession to them in Lent whether they can recite their Creed Pater noster and ten Commandements in English before they receive the blessed Sacrament of the Altar or else they ought not to presume to come to Gods board 10. That none be admitted to preach except sufficiently licensed 11. That if they have heretofore extolled Pilgrimages Reliques worshipping of Images c. they now openly recant and reprove the same as a common errour groundlesse in Scripture 12. That they detect and present such who are Letters of the Word of God in English and Fautours of the Bishop of Rome his pretended power 13. That a Register-Book be carefully kept in every Parish for Weddings Christnings and Burialls 14. That all Ecclestasticall persons not resident upon their Benefices and able to dispend yearly twenty pounds and above shall in the presence of the Church-Wardens or some other honest men distribute the fourtieth part of their revenues amongst the poor of the Parish 15. That every Ecclesiasticall person shall give competent exhibition to so many Schollers in one of the Universities as he hath hundred pounds a year in Church promotions 16. That the fift part of their Benefices be bestowed on their Mansion-houses or Chancells till they be fully repaired 17. That he readeth these Injunctions once a Quarter 18. That none bound to pay Tithes detain them by colour of Duty omitted by their Curates and so redoub one wrong with another 19. That no person henceforth shall alter any Fasting-day that is commanded or manner of Common Prayer or Divine Service otherwise then specified in these Injunctions untill otherwise ordered by the Kings authority 20. That every Ecclesiasticall person under the degree of Batchelour of Divinity shall within three Months after this Visitation provide of his own the New Testament in Latine and English with Erasmus his Paraphrase thereon And that Bishops by themselves and their Officers shall examine
shall be requisite In pursuance of these their Instructions the Kings Commissioners in their respective Counties recovered much and discovered more of Church-wealth and Ornaments For some were utterly imbeziled by persons not responsible and there the King must lose his right More were concealed by parties not detectable so cunningly they carried their stealths seeing every one who had nimmed a Church-Bell did not ring it out for all to hear the sound thereof Many potent persons well known to have such goods shufled it out with their greatnesse mutually connived at therein by their equalls fellow-offenders in the same kinde However the Commissioners regained more than they expected confidering the distance of time and the cold scent they followed so many years after the Dissolution This Plate and other Church-Utensils were sold and advanced much money to the Exchequer An * Sir John Hayward Authour telleth us That amongst many which they found they left but one silver Chalice to every Church too narrow a proportion to populous Parishes where they might have left two at the least seeing for expedition sake at great Sacraments the Minister at once delivereth the wine to two Communicants But they conceived one Cup enough for a small Parish and that greater and richer were easily able to purchase more to themselves 2. All this Income rather stayed the stomack Durham Bishoprick dissolved than satisfied the hunger of the Kings Exchequer For the allaying whereof the Parliament now sitting conferred on the Crown the Bishoprick of Durham This may be called the English Herbipolis or Wirtz-burge it being true of both Dunelmia sola judicat Ense Stola The Bishop whereof was a Palatine or Secular Prince and his Seal in form resembleth Royalty in the Roundnesse thereof and is not Oval the badge of plain Episcopacy Rich and entire the revenues of this See such as alone would make a considerable addition to the Crown remote the scituation thereof out of Southern sight and therefore if dissolved the sooner out of mens mindes Besides Cuthbert Tunstall the present Bishop of Durham was in durance and deprived for his obstinacy so that so stubborn a Bishop gave * yet the Duke of Northumberland either was or was to be possessour thereof the State the fairer quarrell with so rich a Bishoprick now annexed to the Kings revenue 3. Well it was for this See Afterwards restored by Qu. Mary though dissolved that the lands thereof were not dispersed by sale unto severall persons but preserved whole and entire as to the main in the Crown Had such a dissipation of the parts thereof been made no lesse than a State miracle had been requisite for the recollection thereof Whereas now within two years after Queen Mary restored Tunstall to this Bishoprick and this Bishoprick to it self re-setling all the lands on the same 4. By this time A wood rather a wildernesse of the Popes Canons such Learned men as were employed by the King to reform the Ecclesiastical Laws had brought their work to some competent perfection Let me enlarge my self on this subject of concernment for the Readers satisfaction When the Pope had ingrossed to his Courts the cognizance of all causes which either looked glanced or pointed in the least degree at what was reduceable to Religion he multiplied Laws to magnifie himself Whose principal designe therein was not to make others good but himself great not so much to direct and defend the good to restrain and punish the bad as to ensnare and entangle both For such the number of their Clementines 〈◊〉 Intrd. Extravagants Provincialls Synodalls Glosses Sentences Chapters Summaries Rescripts Breviaries long and short Cases c. that none could carry themselves so cautiously but would be rendred obnoxious and caught within the compasse of offending Though the best was for money they might buy the Popes pardon and thereby their own innocence 5. Hereupon Two and thirty Regulatours of the Canon-Law when the Popes power was banished out of England his Canon-Law with the numerous Books and branches thereof lost its authority in the Kings Dominions Yet because some gold must be presumed amongst so much drosse grain amongst so much chaffe it was thought fit that so much of the Canon Law should remain as was found conformable to the Word of God and Laws of the Land And therefore King Henry the eighth was impowred by Act of Parliament to elect two and thirty able persons to reform the Ecclesiastical Laws though in His Reign very little to good purpose was performed therein 6. But the designe was more effectually followed in the daies of King Edward the sixth Contracted to eight by King Edward the 6. reducing the number of two and thirty to eight thus mentioned in His Letters Patents dated at Westminster the last year Novemb 11. Bishops Thomas Cranmer of Canterbury Thomas Goodrich of Elie. Divines Peter Martyr Richard Cox Civilians and Canonists Dr. William May. Dr. Rowland Taylor of Hadley Common Lawyers John Lucas Rich Goodrick Esquires It was not onely convenient but necessary that Common Lawyers should share in making these Church Constitutions because the same were to be built not onely sure in themselves but also symmetricall to the Municipall Lawes of the Land These Eight had power by the Kings Patents to call in to their assistance what persons they pleased and are said to have used the pens of Sir John Cheeke and Walter Haddon Dr. in Law to turn their Lawes into Latine 7. However Laws no Laws not stamped with Royall Authority these had onely a preparing no concluding power so that when they had ended their work two things were wanting to make these Ecclesiastical Canons thus by them composed have the validity of Laws First an exact review of them by others to amend the mistakes therein As where * Titulo de Divinis Officiâ—s cap. 6. they call the Common Prayer Book then used in England proprium perfectum omnis divini cultus judicem magistrum a title truly belonging onely to the Scripture Secondly a Royall ratification thereunto which this King prevented by death nor any of His Successours ever stamped upon it Indeed I finde in an * Iohn 〈◊〉 at the end of his Preface to his Book intituled Reformation no enemy to Her Majesty Author whom I am half-ashamed to alledge that Doctor Haddon Anno 12 or 13 Elizabeth delivered in Parliament a Latine Book concerning Church-Discipline written in the daies of King Edward the sixt by Mr. Cranmer Sir John Cheek c. which could be no other than this lately mentioned Which Book was committed by the House unto the said Mr. Haddon Mr. George Bromley Mr. Norton c. to be translated I conceive into English again and never after can I recover any mention thereof save that some thirteen years since * Anno 1640. A silent Convocation it was printed in London 8. A Parliament was called in the last of this Kings
so to mislike as written in a Romish stile smelling of a Romish inquisition c. I cannot but greatly marvell at your Lordships vehement speeches against them I hope without cause The men are Preachers peaceable your Lordship saith and that they are orderly and observe the Books as some of them say of themselves and you think it not meet that being such persons they should be deprived for not subscribing only wherein I have yielded unto you and therefore have caused these Articles to be drawn according to Law by the best learned in the Laws who I dare say hate the Romish doctrine and the Romish inquisition to the intent I may truly understand whether they are such manner of men or no as they pretend to be which I also take to be the ordinary course in other Courts as in the Sar-Chamber and other places Sure I am it is most usuall in the Court of the Marches Arches rather whereof I have the best experience And without offence be it spoken I think these Articles more tolerable and better agreeing with the rule of justice and charity and less captious then those in other Courts because there men are often examined at the relation of a private man concerning private crimes de propriâ turpitudinê whereas here men are only examined of their publick actions in the publick calling and Ministry and much more in the cause of Heresie because the one toucheth life and the other not And therefore I see no cause why our Judiciall and Canonicall proceedings in this point should be misliked Your Lordship writeth that the two for whom you write are peaceable persons that they deny the things wherewith they are charged and desire to be tried c. Now they are to be tried why do they refuse it Qui malè agit odit Lucem Indeed they shew themselves to be such as I have before shewed to your Lordship the most troublesome persons in all that Countrey and one of them M r Brown is presented for his disorders by the sworn men of the parish as I am informed by the Official there Wherefore I beseech your Lordship not to believe them against me either own words or testimony of any such as animate them in their disobedience and count disorder order and contention peace before they be duly and orderly tried according to that Law which is yet in force and will hardly in my opinion in these Judicial actions be bettered though some abuse may be in the Execution thereof as there I elsewhere also and that peradventure more abundantly Your Lordship saith these Articles are a device rather to seek for offenders then to reform any The like may be said of the like orders in other Courts also but that were the fault of the Judg not of the Law And I trust your Lordship hath no cause to think so evil of me I have not dealt with any as yet but such as have given evident tokens of contempt of Orders and Laws which my Acts remaining on Record will testifie and though the Register do examin them as I think other officers do in other Courts likewise and the Law doth allow of it yet are they repeated before a Judg where they may reform add or diminish as they think good neither hath there been any man thus examined or otherwise dealt with who hath not been conferred with or might not have been if he would these two especially And if they have otherwise reported to your Lordship they do but antiquum obtinere which is to utter untruths a quality wherewith these kinde of men are marvelously possessed as I on my own knowledge and experience can justifie against divers of them I know your Lordship desireth the peace of the Church and unity in Religion but how is it possible to be procured after so long liberty and lack of discipline if a few persons so meanly qualified as most of them are shall be countenanced against the whole estate of the Clergie of greatest account both for learning years stayedness wisdom Religion and honesty And open breakers and impugners of the Law yong in years proud in conceit contentious in disposition maintained against their Governours seeking to reduce them to order and obedience Haec sunt initia haereticorum ortus atque conatus Schismaticorum malè cogitantium ut sibi placeant ut praepositum superbo tumore contemnant sic ab Ecclesia receditur sic altare profanum collocatur foris sic contra pacem Christi ordinationem atque unitatem Dei rebellatur for my own part I neither have done nor do any thing in this matter which I do not think in my conscience and duty I am bound to do which her Majestie hath with earnest charge committed unto me and which I am not well able to justifie to be most requisite for this State and Church whereof next to her Majestie though most unworthy or at least most unhappy the chief is committed unto me which I will not by the grace of God neglect whatsoever come upon me Therefore I neither care for the honour of the place which is onus to me nor the largeness of the Revenues nor any other worldly thing I thank God in respect of doing my duty neither do I fear the displeasure of man nor the evil tongues of the uncharitable who call me Tyrant Pope Knave and lay to my charge things which I never thought Scio hoc enim opus esse diabolt ut servos Dei mendacio laceret opinionibus falsis gloriosum nomen infamet ut qui conscientiae suae luce clarescunt alienis rumoribus sordidentur So was Cyprian himself used and other ancient and Godly Bishops to whom I am not comparable The day will come when all mens hearts shall be opened in the mean time I will depend on him who never forsakes those that put their trust in him If your Lordship shall keep those two from answering according to the order set down it will be of it self a setting at liberty of all the rest and of undoing of all that which hitherto hath been done neither shall I be able to do my duty according to her Majesties expectation And therefore I beseech your Lordship to leave them unto me I will not proceed against them till I have made you privy to their answers and further conferred with you about them because I see your Lordship so earnest in their behalf whereof also they have made publick boasts as I am informed which argueth what manner of persons they are I beseech your Lordship to take not onely the length but also the matter of this Letter in good part and to continue to me as you have done whereof I doubt not for assuredly if you forsake me which I know you will not after so long triall and experience with continuance of so great friendship especially in so good a cause I shall think my coming to this place to have been for my punishment and my hap
Anno 1630. it nothing related to those opinons he did or his followers do maintain For as I am credibly informed being by the Constable of the Parish who chanced also to be his God-son somewhat roughly and rudely required the payment of a rate he happ'ned in passion to strike him The Constable not taking it patiently as a castigation from a God-father but in anger as an affront to his office complained to S r. Rowland S r. John a neighbouring Justice of the peace and Brown is brought before him The Knight of himself was prone rather to pity and pardon than punish his passion but Browns behaviour was so stubborn that he appeared obstinately ambitious of a prison as desirous after long absence to renew his familiarity with his ancient acquaintance His Mittimus is made and a cart with a feather-bed provided to carry him he himself being so infirme above eighty to goe too unweldie to ride and no friend so favourable as to purchase for him a more comly conveyance To Northampton jayle he is sent where soon after he sickned died and was buried in a neighbouring Church-yard and it is no hurt to wish that his bad opinions had been interred with him 7. The Tenents of Brownists daily increasing June 4. 6. July 6. their books were prohibited by the Queens authority Two Brownists executed Notwithstanding which prohibition some presumed to disperse the same and paid dearly for their contempt therein For Elias a Stow Chronicle pag. 697. Thacker was hanged on the fourth and John Coping on the sixth of June at the same place St. Edmonds Burie and for the same offence the scattering such schismatical pamphlets 8. John Whitgift succeeding in the Arch-Bishoprick Sept. 24. found it much surcharged in the valuation Whitgift succeedeth him and empaired in the revenues through the negligence of his predecessour who would pay willingly what they asked of him and take contentedly what any tendered to him First therefore Whitgift b Sr. George Paul in his life pag. 28. procured an order out of the Exchequer for the abatement of an hundred pound for him and his successours in the payment of his first-fruits Afterwards he encountred no meaner man than that great Courtier Souldier and Privie-Councellour S r. James Crosts or rather he legally contested with the Queen in him and recovered from both long c Idem p. 29. Beachwood in Kent containing above a thousand acres of land detained from his predecessour under colour of a lease from Her Majesty 9. This d Camdens Eliz. in hoc Anno. year Nicholas Sanders more truly Slanders Death of Sanders had in Ireland a wofull end of his wretched life He was borne in Sâ—rrey bred first in Winchester then in New Colledge in Oxford where he was Kings-Professor of Canon-Law but afterwards banishing himself fled to Rome there made Priest and D r. of Divinity He accompanied Cardinal Hosius to the Councel of Trent and there is said by disputing and declaiming to have gained himself great reputation At last he was sent over Popes Nuncio into Ireland conceived then a desperate employment and therefore many Catholicks regreted thereat Yea some were overheard to say but it is e De scriptor Anglican aetate 16. pag. 773. Pitzaeus Sander's own sisters son who reports it Why does his Holiness send our Sanders into Ireland We value him more then all Ireland is worth There amongst the bogs and mountains was he starved to death justly famished for want of food who formerly had surfited on improbable lies by him first forged on the nativity of Queen Elizabeth 10. We must not forget Lewes burnt at Norwich how this year one John Lewes was burnt at Norwich for denying the Godhead of Christ and holding other detestable heresies He called himself f Stows Chron. pag. 697. Abdeit let him tell you what he meant thereby alluding therein to the promise of a new g Rev. 2. 17. name which no man knoweth but him that receiveth it having in it a little mock-Hebrew to make himself the more remarkable 11. Now 27. 1584. so great was the malice of the Jesuits against Her Majesty Popish libels that at this time they set forth many slanderous libels stirring up Her Subjects and Servants to do the same to Her as Judith did to h Camdens Eliz. in hoc Anno. Holofernes One of their principal pamphlets was intitled A Treatise of Schism The suspicion of making it fell on Gregory Martin one probable enough for such a prank as being Divinity Professor in Rhemes did not his Epitaph there i Pitzaeus Descript Anglic pag. 782. ensure me he was dead and buried two years before Though it is possible his posthume work might be born abroad after the death of the author thereof But whoever made it William Carter the Stationer paid dearly for publishing it being executed at Tiburn And in the next moneth five Seminaries John Fen George Haddock John Munden John Nutter and Thomas Hemmerford were hanged bowelled and quartered for treason at Tiburn and many others about the same time Anno Dom. 1584. Anno Regin Eliza. 27. executed in other places 12. Yet The Queen Her eminent mercy even in the midst of this necessarie severity Her Majesty was most mercifull unto many Popish malefactors whose lives stood forfeited to the Laws in the rigour thereof For no fewer then seventy Priests some of them actually condemned to die all legally deserving death were by one act of Grace pardoned and sent over beyond sea Amongst these were 1. Gaspar Heywood son to that eminent Epigrammatist the first a Camdens Eliz. 1584. Jesuite that ever set foot in England 2. James Bosgrave 3. John Hart a learned man zealous to dispute not dangerous to practice for his religion 4. Edward Rishton ungrateful wretch who afterwards railed in print on the Queen who gave him his life Her Majesties mercy herein was the more remarkable because done at a time when treasons against her person by Arden Summerfield Throgmorton c. did follow or rather tread one on another If hereafter the edge of justice fall sharper on Jesuits let them thank their own trechery which whetted it against themselves 13. This year two conferences or disputations were kept Two fruitless Conferences the last at Lambeth about the Discipline and Ceremonies of the Church 1. Whitgift Arch-Bishop of Canterbury Sandys of York and Cooper of Winchester for the same 2. Unconforming Ministers whose names I cannot certainly attain against it 3. The Lords of Her Majesties Privie Councell and some other persons of Honour Auditors thereof This Conference effected nothing on the disputants as to the altering of their opinions little on the Auditors but as much on all as any judicious person ever expected What Eliah said passionately b 1 King 19. 4. I am no better then my Fathers may be soberly said of this conference It was no happier then
not legally be conveyed to any Petitioner Ann. Dom. 1604 Ann Reg. Jac. 2 Thus his Majesty manifested his good will and affection to Religion and although this Law could not finally preserve Church-lands to make them immortall yet it prolonged their lives for many yeares together 12. Passe we now into the Convocation The Acts of this Convocation why as 〈…〉 recovered to see what was done there But here the History thereof as I may say is shot betwixt the joynts of the Armor in the intervall after Whitgift's death and before Bancroft's removall to Canterbury so that I can finde the Originall thereof neither in the Office of the Vicar-generall nor in the Registry of London not can I recover it as yet from the Office of the Dean and Chapter of Canterbury where most probably it is to be had the Jurisdiction belonging to them in the Vacancy 13. Take this as the result thereof Many Canon made therein Bishop Bancroft sitting President A Book of Canons was compiled not onely being the summe of the Queens Articles Orders of her Commissioners Advertisements Canons of 1571. and 1597. which were in use before but also many more were added the whole number amounting unto 141. Some wise and moderate men supposed so many Lawes were too heavy a burden to be long borne and that it had been enough for the Episcopall party to have triumphed not insulted over their adversaries in so numerous impositions However an Explanation was made in one of the Canons of the use of the Crosse in Baptisme to prevent Scandall and learned Thuanus in his History taketh an especiall notice thereof 14. Motion being made in this Convocation Bishop Rudd why opposing the oath against Simony about framing an Oath against Simony to be taken by all presented to Churchpreferment Bishop Rudde of St. Davids as conscientious as any of his order and free from that fault opposed it chiefly because he thought it unequall that the Patron should not be forced as well as the Clerk to take that Oath Whereupon it was demanded of him whether he would have the King to take that Oath when he presented a Bishop or Dean and hereat the Bishop sate downe in silence 15. About this time the Corporation of Rippon in York-shire The Petition of the Town of Rippon to Queen Anne presented their Petition to Queen Anne on this occasion They had a faire Collegiate Church stately for the structure thereof formerly erected by the Nobility and Gentry of the Vicenage the meanes whereof at the dissolution of Abbies were seized on by the King so that small maintenance was left to the Minister of that populous Parish Now although Edwin Sands Arch-bishop of York with the Earle of Huntinton Lord Burgley and Sheaffield successively Presidents of the North had recommended their Petition to Qu. Elizabeth they obtained nothing but faire unperformed Promises whereupon now the Ripponeers humbly addressed themselves to Queen Anne and hear her answer unto them ANNA R. ANNE by the grace of God Qu. of England Scotland France and Ireland c. To all to whom these presents shall come greeting Whereas there hath been lately exhibited and recommended unto us a frame and plat-forme of a Colledge Generall to be planted and established at Rippon in the County of Yorke for the manifold benefit of both the Borders of England and Scotland Upon the due perusing of the plot aforesaid hereunto annexed and upon signification given of the good liking and approbation of the chief points contained therein by sundry grave learned and religious parties and some other of honourable Place and Estate We have thought good for the ample and perpetuall advancement of Learning and Religion in both the borders of our aforesaid Realmes to condescend to yeild our favour and best furtherance thereunto And for the better encouraging of other honourable and worthy Personages to joyn with us in yeilding their bounty and benevolence thereunto We have and do signifie and assure and by the word of a sacred Princesse and Queen do expresly promise to procure with all convenient speed to and for the yearely better maintenance of the said Colledge All and every of the Requests specified and craved to that end in a small Schedule hereunto annexed In confirmation whereof we have signed these Presents by our hand and name above mentioned and have caused our privy Signet to be set unto the same July 4. Dated at our Honour at Greenwich July 4. An. Dom. 1604. and of our Reigne c. After the sealing thus subscribed Gulielmus Toulerius Secretarius de mandate serenissimae Annae Reginae Angliae Scotiae Franciae Hiberniae 16. Such need never fear successe King James his bountifull grant who have so potent a person to solicite their suite King James being forward of himselfe to advance Learning and Religion and knowing Christs precept Let your Light shine before Men knew also that Rippon was an advantagious place for the fixing thereof As which by its commodious position in the North there would reflect lustre almost equally into England and Scotland Whereupon he founded a Dean and Chapter of seven Prebends allowing them two hundred forty seven pounds a yeare out of his own Crowne-land for their maintenance 17. I am informed These Lands since twice sold that lately the Lands of this Church are by mistake twice sold to severall Purchasers viz. Once under the notion of Dean and Chapters Lands and againe under the property of Kings Lands I hope the Chapâ—men when all is right stated betwixt them will agree amongst themselves on their bargaine Mean time Rippon Church may the better comport with poverty because onely remitted to its former condition 18. The Family of Love or Lust rather at this time The Petition of the Family of Love to King James presented a tedious Petition to King James so that it is questionable whether His Majesty ever graced it with his perusall wherein they endeavoured to cleare themselves from some misrepresentations and by fawning expression to insinuate themselves into his Majesty's good opinion Which here we present To the King 's most excellent MAJESTY JAMES the first by the grace of God King of England Scotland France and Ireland Defender of the Faith c. MOst gracious and Sveraigne Lord whereas there is published in a Book written by your Highnesse as an instruction to your most noble * * In his Basilicon Doron Sonne whom Almighty God blesse with much Honour Happinesse and Long life of a People that are of a vile Sect among the Anabaptists called the Family of Love who doe hold and maintaine many proud uncharitable unchristian and most absurd Opinions unto whom your Highnesse doth also give the name of Puritans assuming in the said Book that divers of them as Brown Penry and others doe accord with them in their foule Errours heady and phantasticall Opinions which are there set downe at large by Your Majesty
to be improved 3. The necessity of hâ—s friendship at this time was onely fancied â—y such as desired it Besides the King of heaven must not be offended that the King of Spain may be pleased 4. Though Truth it selfe be stronger than falsehood yet generally the Promoters of falsehood are more active and sedulous than the Advancers of Truth Besides it is just with God upon the granting of such an unlawfull Toleration to weaken the converting power of Truth and strengthen the perverting power of Falsehood giving the English over to be deluded thereby 5. The world hath ever consisted of more fools than wise people such who carry their judgment more in their eyes than in their brains Popery being made Inscious to peoples senses too probably would court many to the imbracing thereof 6. It is no policie to let in the Wolfe meerly on designe to make the Shepherds more watchfull Rather on the contrary Protestant Ministers would be utterly disheartned in the performance of their place when the Parishioners were countenanced to desert them without any punishment 7. If the Papists already have what they would have let them be contented therewith Why desire they any more but indeed there is a grand difference betwixt a States winking at their wickednesse for a time and a formall and finall tolerating thereof During the former Catholicks sin on their own account and at their own peril the Laws though not executed standing in full force against them but a publick Toleration of their Superstition adopts the same to become the Act of the English Nation Here it would be tedious to recite the Texts of Scripture some more The Pulpit is loud against the Toleration some lesse proper to the purpose alledged by severall persons against the Toleration Ann. Dom. 1623. Ann. Regis Ja 21. some Typicall Thou a Deht 22. 10. shalt not plow with an Oxe and an Asse Some Historicall Gods Children must not speak two tongues Ashdod and b Neh. 13. 24. Hebrew Some Doctrinall We must not doe evil that good c Rom. 3. 8. may come thereof The best was the Toleration bare date with the Spanish Match with which it was propounded and agitated advanced expected desired by some opposed suspected detested by others and at last both together finally frustrated and defeated 3. Now was His Majestie informed His Majesties care to regulate Preaching that it was high time to apply some cure to the Pulpits as sick of a Sermon-surfeit and other exorbitances Some medled with State-matters and generally by an improper Transposition the Peoples duty was preached to the King at Court the Kings to the People in the Countrey Many shallow Preachers handled the profound points of Predestination wherein pretending to guide their flocks they lost themselves Sermons were turned into Satyrs against Papists or Non Conformists 4. To represse the present and prevent future mischiefs in this kinde His Majestie issued out His Directions to be written fair in every Registers Office whence any Preacher if so pleased might with his own hand take out Copies gratis paying nothing for d Cabala part 2. pag. 191. expedition Herein the King revived the primitive and profitable order of Catechizing in the afternoon better observed in all other Reformed Churches than of late in England according to the tenour ensuing Most Reverend Father in God His Directions right trusty and entirely beloved Counsellour We greet you well FOrasmuch as the abuses and extravagancies of Preachers in the Pulpit have been in all times repressed in this Realm by some Act of Councill or State with the advice and resolution of grave and learned Prelates Insomuch that the very licensing of Preachers had beginning by an Order of Star Chamber the eighth day of July in the 19 th year of the Reign of King Henry the eighth our Noble Predecessour And whereas at this present divers young Students by reading of late Writers and ungrounded Divines doe broach many times unprofitable unsound seditions and dangerous Doctrines to the scandall of the Church and disquiet of the State and present Government We upon humble representations unto Us of these inconveniencies by your selfe and sundry other grave and reverend Prelates of this Church as also of our Princely care and Zeal for the extirpation of Schisme and dissention growing from these seeds and for the setling of a religious and peaceable Government both in Church and Common wealth doe by these Our speciall Letters straitly charge and command you to use all possible care and diligence that these Limitations and Cautions herewith sent unto you concerning Preachers be duly and strictly from henceforth put in practice and observed by the several Bishops within your Jurisdiction And to this end Our pleasure is that you send them forthwith Copies of these Directions to be by them speedily sent and communicated unto every Parson Vicar Curate Lecturer and Minister in every Cathedrall or Parish Church within their severall Diocese and that you earnestly require them to employ their utmost endeavours in the performance of this so important a businesse letting them know that We have a speciall eye unto their proceedings and expect a strict account thereof both of you and every one of them and these Our Letters shall be your sufficient Warrant and discharge in that behalf Give under our Signet at Our Castle of Windsor the 4 th of August in the twentieth year of Our Reign Directions concerning Preachers sent with the Letter 1. THat no Preacher under the degree and calling of a Bishop or Dean of a Cathedral or Collegiate Church and they upon the Kings dayes and set Festivals doe take occasion by the expounding of any Text of Scripture whatsoever to fall into any set Discourse or Common place otherwise than by the opening the Cohaerence and Division of the Text which shall not be comprehended and warranted in essence substance effect or naturall in ference within some one of the Articles of Religion set forth 1562. or in some of the Homilies set forth by authority of the Church of England not onely for the help of the Non-Preaching but withall for a Pattern and Boundary as it were for the Preaching Ministers And for their further instructions for the performance hereof that they forthwith reade over and peruse diligently the said Book of Articles and the two Books of Homilies 2. That no Parson Vicar Curate or Lecturer shall preach any Sermons or Collation hereafter upon Sundaies and Holidaies in the afternoon in any Cathedrall or Parish Church throughout the Kingdome but upon some pare of the Catechisme or some Text taken out of the Creed ten Commandments or the Lords Prayer Funeral Sermons onely excepted and that those Preachers be most encouraged and approved of who spend the Afternoons exercise in the examination of Children in their Catechisme which is the most antient and laudable custome of teaching in the Church of England 3. That no Preacher of what title
W. Prynne in Canterbury's Doom pag. 121 sequentiâ—us superabundant ceremonies thereof To which I can say little but this I dare affirm that wheresoever he was a Parson a Dean or a Bishop he never troubled Parish Colledge or Diocess with pressing other ceremonies upon them then such which he found used there before his coming thither And it had not been amiss if such who would be accounted his friends and admirers had followed him in the footsteps of his moderation content with the enjoying without the injoyning their private practises and opinions on others 49. As for such who causlesly have charged his Sermons as affected Causlesly charged with affectation in his Sermons and c Mr. Bayley in his Ladeâ—sium Autocatacriton surcharged with verball allusions when they themselves have set forth the like it will then be time enough to make this Bishops first defence against their calumniations Nor is it a wonder that the Mâ—sters Pen was so in his writings whose very Servant a Lay man was so successefull in the same I mean Mr. Henry Isackson lately gone to God the industrious Author of the usefull Chronologie 50. It is pitie to part this Patron from his Chaplain Nicholas Fuller his Chaplain that profitable Critick Nicholas Fuller born as I take it in Hampshire bred in Oxford where he was Tutor to Sir Henry Walhop who afterwards preferred him to the small Parsonage of Aldingeton in Wiltshire And Robert Abbot Bishop of Salisbury made him Canon of that Church Afterwards a Living of great value was sent by Bishop Andrews the Patron d See Bishop And his funeral Sermon thereof on the welcom errand to finde out Mr. Fuller to accept the same who was hardly contented to be surprised with a presentation thereunto such his love to his former smal Living and retired life He was the Prince of all our English Criticks And whereas men of that tribe are generally morose so that they cannot dissent from another without disdaining nor oppose without inveighing against him it is hard to say whether more candor learning or judgement was blended in his Miscellanies By discovering how much Hebrew there is in the New-Testament-Greek he cleereth many reall difficulties from his verball observations 51. A Commission was granted unto five Bishops whereof Bishop Laud of the Quorum to suspend Archbishop Abbot from exercising his Authority any longer 3 1627 Severe proceedings against Archbishop Abbot suspended from his Jurisdiction because uncanonicall for casuall Homicide the proceeding against him being generally condemned as over-rigid and severe 1. The Act was committed seven years since in the reign of King James 2. On a Commission then appointed for that purpose he was cleered from all Irregularity by Bishop Andrews in Divinity Sir Ed. Coke in Common and Sir Henr. Martin in Canon Law 3. It would be of dangerous consequence to condemn him by the Canons of forain Councels which never were allowed any Legislative Power in this Land 4. The Archbishop had manifested much remorse and self-affliction for this rather sad than sinful act 5. God may be presumed to have forgotten so much as there was of fault in the fact and why then should man remember it 6. Ever since he had executed his Jurisdiction without any interruption 7. The Archbishop had both feet in the Grave Anno Dom. 1627 Anno Regis Car. 1. 3 and all his whole Body likely soon after to follow them 8. Such heighsning of Casual-Homicide did â—avour of Intentional malice The truth is the Archbishops own stiffness and aversness to comply with the Court-Designes advantaged his Adversaries against him and made him the more obnoxious to the Kings displeasure But the blame did most light on Bishop Laud men accounting this a kinde of Filius ante diem c. As if not content to succeed he indeavored to supplant him who might well have suffered his decayed old age to have died in honor What needs the felling of the tree a falling 52. However a double good accrued hereby to the Archbishop Two good effects of a bad cause First he became the more beloved of Men the Countrey hath constantly a blessing for those for whom the Court hath a curse And secondly he may charitably be presumed to love God the more whose service he did the better attend being freed from the drudgery of the World as that soul which hath the least of Martha hath the most of Mary therein 53. And although this Archbishop survived some years after The character of Archbishop Abbot yet it will be seasonable here for us to take a fair farewell of his memorie seeing henceforward he was buried to the World He was bred in Oxford Master of University Colledge an excellent Preacher as appears by his Lectures on Jonah Chaplain to the Earl of Dunbar with whom he was once solemnly sent by King James into Scotland to preach there and afterwards by his means promoted to the Arch-bishop-rick of Canterbury haply according to his own but sure I am above if not against the expectations of others A grave man in his conversavion and unblameable in his life 54. Indeed it is charged on him that non amavit Gentem nostram Accounted no great friend to the Clergy he loved not our Nation forsaking the Birds of his own feather to flie with others and generally favoring the Laity above the Clergie in all cases brought before him But this he endeavored to excuse to a private friend by protesting he was himself so severe to the Clergie on purpose to rescue them from the severity of others and to prevent the punishment of them from Lay Judges to their greater shame 55. I also reade in a nameless e In answer to the Pamphlet intituled The Court and Character of King James page 132. Author Accused for the fautor of male-contents that towards his death he was not onely discontented himself but his house was the randezvouz of all male-contents in Church and State making mid-night of noon-day by constant keeping of candles light in his Chamber and Study as also such visitants as repaired unto him called themselves Nicodemits because of their secret addresses But a credible f Dr. Barnard his Houshold Chaplain person and one of his neerest relations knew nothing thereof which with me much shaketh the probability of the report And thus we leave this Archbishop and the rest of his praises to be reported by the poor people of Gilford in Surrey where he founded and indowed a fair Almes-house in the Town of his Nativity 56. The Kings Treasury now began to grow low A Toleration blasted in Ireland and his expenses to mount high No wonder then if the Statesmen were much troubled to make up the distance betwixt his Exchequer and his Occasions Amongst other designes the Papists in Ireland taking advantage of the Kings wants proffered to pay constantly 5000 Men if they might but enjoy a
crossing the Protectour herein and other misdemeaners soon after was outed of his Mastership of Trinity Hall Anno Regis Henrici 8. 2 and first Doctor Haddon Anno Dom. 154 7 8 then Doctor Mouse substituted in his room William Bill 3 Vice-Chan 154 8 9 George Bullock Phil. Baker Proct. Richard Brakin Major Doct Theol. 1 Bac. Theol. 1 Mag. Art 8 Bac. Art 32 30. Commissioners An extraordinary Act before the Kings Commissioners were sent from the King to visit the University viz. Thomas Goodrich Bishop of Eelie Nicolas Ridley Bishop of Rochester Sir William Paget Sir Thomas Smith Sir Iohn Cheek VVilliam Mey Doctor of Law and Thomas VVendey Doctor of Physick Before these an extraordinary Act was kept wherein Answerer Opponents Moderatours Quaestions D r. Madew Iune 20 Protest held the negat Doct. Mag. Glin. Langedale Sedgewick Yonge Papists His Majesties Commissioners above mentioned 1. Whether Transubstantiation can be proved by plain and manifest words of Scripture 2. Whether it may be Collected confirmed by the consent of Fathers for these thousand years past Answerer Dr. Glin 24 Papist held the affirm Mag. Grindal Perne Gwest Pilkington Protestants M r. Pern Protest 25 held the negat Mag. Parker not D r. Mathew Parker but another of his Name Pollard Vavasour Youge Papists Bishop Ridley according to the custome of the University concluded all with a solemn Determination But the transactions of this Disputation are so amply reported by Master Fox that the sharpest appetite of his Reader need not fear famishing if he can keep himself from surfetting thereon Walter Haddon 4 Vice-Cha 15 49 50 Andrew Peerson Iohn Ebden Proct. Alexander Raye Major Bac. Theol 9 Mag. Art 17 Bac. Art 26 31. Ed. Duke of Somerset and Chancellour of Cambridge was much declined in his power at Court Northumberland made Chancellour though surviving some Months after Now the University had learned to live by the living Anno Dom. 15 in favour and not by the dead Anno Regis Edvardi 6. 4 and therefore chose Iohn Dudley Duke of Northumberland Chancellour in place of Somerset 32. Martin Bucer Bucer and Fagius called to Cambridge and Paulus Fagius in Dutch Buchlein or Beecher living formerly at Strasburg at the instance of Arch-Bishop Cranmer were sent for by King Edward to become Professours in Cambridge My Authour a Germane living then hard by makes them to depart thence Magistratus Argentinensis voluntate consensu whom the Iesuite Parsons will have both banished by that State If so the disgrace is none at all to be exiled for no other guilt then preaching the Gospel opposing the Augustine Confession which that Emperiall City embraced Besides the greater the providence if when commanded from one place instantly called to another 33. Over they come into England Made Professours there and last year were fixed at Cambridge where Bucer was made Professour of Divinity Fagius of Hebrew The former had the ordinary stipend of his place tripled a Pantalcon de Illustribus Germaniae unto him as well it might considering his worth being of so much merit his need having wife and children and his condition coming hither a forrainer fetcht from a far Country So it was ordered that Fagius should in Hebrew read the Evangelicall Prophet Isaâ—ah and Bucer in Greek the Propheticall Evangelist S t. Iohn 34 But alas Fagius his death the change of aire and diet so wrought on their temper that both fell sick together Bucer hardly recovered but Fagius that flourishing Beech nature not agreeing with his transplanting withered away in the flower of his Age as scarce fourty five and was buried in the Church of S t. Michael 35. After his death Emanuel Tremellius was sent for to Cambridge to succeed him in the Professours place Tremellius Heb Prof. in Cambridge There he lived sometime on this token that Dr. Parker preferred him before many other Friends to be Godfather to his Son which Tremellius b See Tremellius his own Preface to his Caldee Grammar accounted a great favour But it seemeth that soon after either afrighted with the valetudinous condition of King Edward or allured with the bountifull Proffers of the Prince Palatine he returned to Heidelberg Io. Madew Vice-Ch Ralph Standish William Cony Proct. Christop c Cajus Hist. Cant. Acad. lib. 1. p. 207. Franck He would not take his oath to the Vice-Chancellour till forced by the Lord Protectours letters Maj. 155â— â— 5 Doct. Theol. 1 Iur. Civ 2 Medic. 1 Bac. Theol. 4 Mag. Art 17 Bac. Art 37 Henry Brandon Duke of Suffolk Son of Charles Brandon by Katherine Lady VVilloubie died at Cambridge where he was a Student of the sweating-sicknesse 36. Charles Brandon Duke of Suffolk younger brother to the same Henry died within twelve hours of the same disease They were much bemoaned of the University printing a Book of Verses on their funeralls amongst which these following of D r. Parkhursts afterward Bishop of Norwich I shall endeavour to translate FRatres Amiclaei Pollux cum Castore Potuere sic cum morte depaciscier Vt cum alter eorum esset mortuus tamen Alter superesset reversis sortibus Vicissim uterque utriusque morte viveret Cur Parca nunc crudelior est quam olim fuit Anno Regis Edvardi 6 15 Fratres duos Anno Dom. 155â— â— nuper ea quales hactenus Nec vidit unquam nec videbit Anglia Lumina duo duoque propugnacula Fortissima virtutis Reique publicae Mors crudelis ah uno peremit funere Virtus nequaquam illam nec egregia indoles Movit nec Edvardi Regis nec optimae Matris nec totius gemitus Britanniae O dura duramors ô saeva numina The same in English CAstor and Pollux Brothers pair Breathing first Amicle's air Did with death so bargaine make By exchange their turns to take If that death surprized one brother Still alive should be the other So the bargain was contriv'd Both dy'd both by turns surviv'd Why is fate more cruel grown Then she formerly was known Wee of Brothers had a brace Like to which did never grace This our English earth before Nor the like shall grace it more Both bright stars and both did stand Hopefull bulwarks of the land Both alas together slain Death at once did murther twaine Nothing could their vertues move Nor King Edvvards hearty love Nor their best of mothers mones Nor all Britaines heavy grones Nothing could stern death abate Oh cruel over cruel fate Many in Cambridge died of this sweating sicknesse Patients mending or ending in twenty four hours Some sought for the naturall cause thereof out of the heavens imputing it to the conjunction of the superiour Planets in Scorpio Others looked for it from the earth as arising from an exhalation in moist weather out of Gipsous or plaisterly ground The cure thereof conceived impossible before and easie as all things
Recantation tendered unto him which he refused to subscribe though professing his sincere sorrow and penitencie in his Petitions and Letters to the Bishop for any oversights and unbeseeming expressions in his Sermon Hereupon he was sent back to the new Prison where he died If he was miserably abused therein by the Keepers as some have reported to the shortning of his life He that maketh inquisition for blood either hath or will be a revenger thereof Benjamin Lany Vicecan 1632-33 Iohn Lothian Dan Chaundeler Proct. 9. George Saunders Major Richard Love Vicecan 1633-34 Henry Molle Luke Skippon Proct. 10. Robert Twelves Major 27. Now began the University to be much beautified in buildings Organserected in Chappels every Colledge either casting its skin with the Snake or renewing its bill with the Eagle having their Courts or at leastwise their fronts and Gate-houses repaired and adorned But the greatest alteration was in their Chappels most of them being graced with the accession of Organs And seeing Musick is one of the Liberal Arts how could it be quarelled at in an University if they sang with understanding both of the matter and manner thereof Yet some took great distant thereat as attendancie to superstition At this time I discontinued my living in the University and therefore crave leave here to break off my History finding it difficult to attain to certain intelligence However because I meet with much printed matter about the visitation of Cambridge in these trouble some times though after some years intervall I shall for a conclusion adventure to give posterity an unpartiall relation thereof 28. Richard Holdesworth being Vice-Chancellour 1641-42 The Masters and Fellows of all Colledges send their plate or money in lieu thereof to the King to Yorke Aug. ult many wishing that every ounce thereof were a pound for His sake Colledge-plate sent to the King conceiving it unfitting that they should have superfluities to spare whilest their Soveraigne wanted necessaries to spend 29. This was beheld by the Parliament as an Act unjust in it self The act aggravated and dangerous in the consequence thereof for the present Masters and Fellowes were onely Fiduciaries not Proprietaries of the Plate to keep and use it not to dispose thereof Was not this obliterating the Records of Gentlemens bounty who had conferred those costly Utensils on the Colledges Besides this was interpreted a somenting of the Civil War thereby encouraging and enabling the King against His Subjects 30. In vain did the Heads plead for themselves And excused that they affrighted at the plundering of the House of the Countesse of Rivers at Long-Melford the first-fruits of Rapine in our Age did suspect the like violence Plunderers have long Armes and can quickly reach out of Suffolke into Cambridge shire For prevention whereof they thought good to secure some of their Plate in a safe hand and could not finde a fitter than His Majesties Heire to His Ancestours the Founders paramount of all Houses Besides though the clouds look black with a louring complexion yet did it not rain warre downright betwixt King and Parliament Anno Dom. 1641-1642 Anno Regis Car. 1. Aug. it being some daies before the erecting of His Standard at Nottingham 31. Dr. Beale Dr. Martin and Dr. Stern Masters of S. Johns Queens Three Doctors imprisoned in the Tower and Iesus Coll are carried to London and imprisoned in the Tower for their activity in the Plate-businesse And Cambridge is made the Seat of the Committee for the Easterne Association which escaped the best of all parts in this Civil Warre the smoak thereof onely offending those Counties whilst the fire was felt in other places 32. Richard Holdesworth Vicecan Before his year expired he was seized on and imprisoned first in Elie-house then in the Tower for executting His Majesties command in printing at Cambridge such His Declarations as were formerly printed at Yorke Mar. 30. 33. The Vice Chancellour and Heads of Houses solemnly assembled in the Consistorie The Heads deny the Parliament mony were demanded to contribute to the Parliament so to redeem their forwardnesse in supplying the King Which performed by them would notwithstanding their former crooked carriage in the Cause bolster them upright in the Parliaments esteem But they persisted in the Negative that such contributing was against true Religion and a good conscience for which some of them were afterwards imprisoned in S. Iohns Colledge 34. Amongst these was Doctor Samuel Ward Master of Sidney Colledge The death of Dr. Ward and Divinity Professour Lady Margarets or the Kings shall I say in the University For though the former by his Foundation he may seem the later by his resolution Yet was he a Moses not onely for slowness of speech but otherwise meekness of nature Indeed when in my private thoughts I have beheld him and Dr. Collins disputable whether more different or more eminent in their endowments I could not but remember the running of Peter and John to the place where Christ was buried In which race John came first as the youngest and swiftest but Peter first entred into the Grave Doctor Collins had much the speed of him in quicknesse of parts but let me say nor doth the relation of a Pupill misguide me the other pierced the deeper into under-ground and profound points of Divinity Now as high windes bring some men the sooner into sleep so I conceive the storms and tempests of these distracted times invited this good old man the sooner to his long rest where we fairly leave him and quietly draw the curtains about him 35. Now approached the generall Doom of Malignant Members so termed in the University The Oath of Discovery tendred and refused the Earle of Manchester with his two Chaplains Mr. Ash and Mr. Good coming thither to effect a Reformation In preparation whereunto I read how an oath of * Quercla Cantabrigieusis pag. 20. Discovery was tendred to many and universally refused as against all Law and conscience as being thereby made to accuse their nearest and dearest Friends Benefactors Tutors and Masters and betray the Members and Acts of their several Societies contrary to their peaceable Statutes viz Non revelabis aliquod secretum Collegii nec malum aut damnum inferes cuilibet Sociorum Whereupon this Oath was generally denied 36. To be satisfied in the truth hereof Mr. Ash disaâ—oweth any such Oath I wrote to Mr. Ash whose face I had never seen requesting him to inform me such proceedings seeming very strange to my apprehension But heare his Answer TRuly Sir I am so great a stranger to that Oath of Discovery which you mention that I cannot call to minde the moving of any such matter by the Lord of Manchester or any who attended him And as for my selfe having been a Sufferer upon the dislike of the Oath Ex Officio I have all along my life been very tender in appearing as an
he maketh those who were to keep it in some sort Judges of the justness thereof endeavouring to convince their consciences and make their souls sensible of the natural uncleanness of such an act It is thy Brothers nakedness Such marriages are again forbidden in another Text. Anno Dom. 1530 Nor can I render other resson of this Duplicate Anno Regis Hen. 8. 22. whereas others are but once that this should be twice prohibited save that God foreseeing in his providence mens corrupt inclinations prone here to climb over did therefore think fit to make a double fence LEVIT 20. 21. And if a man shall take his Brothers Wife it is an unclean thing he hath uncovered his Brothers Nakedness they shall be Childless Here we have the Prohibition backt with a Commination of being Childless which is variously interpreted either that they shall never have children or if having them they shall not survive their Parents or if surviving they shall not be counted Children but Bastards illegitimate in the Court of Heaven This Commination of being childless as applied ad hominem fell heavy on King Henry the eighth who sensible that his Queen though happy often to conceive was unhappy almost as often to miscarry Henry his onely Christian son by her died before a full year old a second was nameless as never living to the honour of Baptism and of many blasted in the bud Mary onely survived to womans estate 11. Such as inquire into the nature of this Law finde it founded in Nature it self This proved to be a Law of Nature being onely declaratory of what true reason doth dictate to man God in making this Law did not imprint a new writing in mens hearts but onely rub off some old rust from the same wherefore it is added Levit. 18. 27 28. For all these abominations have the men of the Land done which were before you and the Land is defiled that the Land spue not you out also when ye defile it as it spued out the Nations that were before you Surely the Land would never have vomited out the Heathen for not observing a positive precept never immediately delivered unto them which plainly shews it was imprinted in nature though partly obliterated by their corrupt customes to the contrary and their consciences in their Lucid Intervals were apprehensive thereof This would make one the more to admire that any should maintain that this Law the breach whereof made the Country to avoid her Pagan Inhabitants should be onely a Senders de schism Angli pag. 3. lex imposititia Ecclesiastica an imposed and Church-Law To hear of a Church-Law amongst the Canaanites is a strange Paradox 12. It is objected this could not be a Law of Nature The Objection to the contrary because almost at the beginning of nature men brake them by the consent and permission of the God of heaven For Cain and Seth with the elder sons of Adam must be allowed to have married their own sisters far nearer in nature then their Brothers Wife 13. It is answered Answered when God first created man-kinde it was his pleasure all men should derive their original from Eve as she from Adam For had he made as one may say two distinct houses of Man-kinde what falling out and fighting what bickering and battleing would have been betwixt them If men now adayes descended from the loyns of one general Father and womb of one mother are full of so fierce hatred how many and keen may their differences be presumed had they sprung from several Fountains and then all their hatred would have been charged not on their corruption but on their Creation God therefore as the Apostle saith Acts 17. 26. hath made of one bloud all nations Now in the beginning of Mankinde absolute necessity gave Brethren liberty to marry their own sisters Yea God himself interpretatively signed and sealed the same with his own consent because his wisdom had appointed no other means without miracle for the propagation of man-kinde Anno Regis Hen. 8. 82. But when men began to be multiplied on the earth Anno Dom. 1530 that necessity being removed the light of Nature dictated unto them the unlawfulness of such marriages and of some others more remote as coming within the compss of Incest though the corrupt practises of Pagans sometimes trespassed in that kinde God therefore being to give his Law to the Jews cleared and declared that light of Nature by his positive Law unto his people to whom his Goodness gave a Garden and sorbad a Tree so inconsiderable were those few prohibited to the many persons permitted them in marriage For whereas there came out of a Exâ—d 12. 37. Egypt and six hundred thousand men besides children fifty persons at the most counting those forbidden as well by consequence as expresly were interdicted unto them amongst whom one was the Marriage with a Brothers Wife For although God Permitted this by a judicial Law ro his own people in case of b Deut. â—5 5. raising up seed to a Brother deceased childless the Will of God being the Law of Laws yet otherwise it was utterly unlawful as whereon God had stamped as is aforesaid a double Note of natural uncleanness 14. The Law then of forbidding marriage with a Brothers Wife Gods Laws indispensable with by the Pope being founded in nature it was pride and presumption in the Pope to pretend to dispense therewith Indeed we read that the dispensation of the Gospel to see it dealt and distributed to several persons was committed to c 1 Cor. 9. â—â— S t Paul whose joynt successour with S t Peter the Pope pretends to be but a Dispensation from the Law of God to free men from the same neither Paul nor Peter ever pretended unto Let the Pope make relaxations of such Church Canons which meerly Ecclesiastical Authority hath made there he may have the specious power to remit the rigour thereof at some times places and persons as he apprehendeth just occasion But let him not meddle to grant liberty for the breach of Gods Law The first Dispensation in this kinde is what Satan in the Serpent gave our first Parents in Paradice d Gen. 3. 4. you shall not surely dye and whether the Granter had less power therein or the receivers less profit therby we their woful posterity have little comfort to decide 15. Nor doth it any thing alter the case Carnal knowled not material in this controversie what was so much controverted in the Court of Rome whether or no Prince Arthur had carnal knowledge of his Wife seeing we may observe that in the Court of Heaven Marriages bear date not from their Copulation but solemn Contact And they thenceforward are esteemed Man and Wife before God For it is e Deut. 22. 24. provided that if a Damsel be betrothed to Husband still remaining a Virgin and shall be layen with by another man both of
those daies deserveth not ivie in cur Age. Now seeing by the rules of justice and the Kings own appointment His Debts were to be paid before His Legacies and seeing many of His personall debts remained unsatisfied till the daies of Queen Elizabeth probably most of these Legacies were never paid especially to inferiour persons As if it were honour enough for them to have such summs bequeathed unto though never bestowed upon them 53. Whereas mention in this Will of a Monument well onwards and almost made Monument made for the King by the Cardinal it is the same which Cardinal Wolsey built For King Henry and not for himself as is commonly reported Wherefore whereas there goeth a tale That King Henry one day finding the Cardinal with the workmen making His Monument should say unto him Tumble your self in this Tomb whilest you are alive for when dead you shall never lie therein it is a meer fiction the Cardinal originally intending the same for the King as appeareth by the ancient Inscription * Godwin in Hen 8. p. 200. thereupon wherein King Henry was stiled LORD not KING of Ireland without addition of supreme Head of the Church plainly shewing the same was of antient date in the daies of the Cardinal 54. Whereas the Lady Mary and Elizabeth Why His Nieces more at liberty than his Daughters Their marriages are so severely conditioned that if made without consent of the Councell They were to forfeit Their right to the Crown men interpret it as provided in terrorem and not otherwise Yet this clause was it which afterwards put so plausible a pretence on Wiat his rebellion which though made of rotten cloth had notwithstanding a good colour thereon Now whereas the King's Nieces the Daughters to Mary His younger Sister were not clogg'd in this His Will with such restrictions concerning their Marriages the plain reason was because both of them were already married before this Will was made Frances the elder to Henry Gray Marquesse Dorset afterward Duke of Suffolke and Eleanour the younger to Henry Clifford Earl of Cumberland 55. The Portion of but ten thousand pounds a piece left to His two Daughters Ten thousand pounds the portion of a Princesse was not much unproportionable to the value of money as it went in that Age though a summe small for such an use in our daies And I have heard that Queen Elizabeth being informed that Doctor Pilkington Bishop of Durham had given ten thousand pounds in marriage with his Daughter and being offended that a Prelates daughter should equal a Princesse in portion took away one thousand pounds a year from that Bishoprick and assigned it for the better maintenance of the Garrison of Barwick 56. Very much of His own abitrarinesse appears in this Will of King Henry Much of arbitrarinesse in this Will entalling the Crown according to His own fancie against all right and reason For first how unjust was it that His female issue by Queen Katharine Parr His last Wife had He had any should inherit the Crown before Mary and Elizabeth His eldest Daughters by His former Wives If Mary and Elizabeth were not His lawfull Children how came They by any right to the Crown If His lawfull Children why was Their birth-right and seniority not observed in succession Well it was for Them that Henry Fitz Roy His naturall Son but one of supernaturall and extraordinary endowments was dead otherwise some suspect had He survived King Edward the sixth we might presently have heard of a K. Henry the ninth so great was His Fathers affection and so unlimited His power to preferre Him 57. But the grand injury in this His Testament is The Scotish Line quite left out That He quite passeth over the Children of Margaret His eldest Sister married into Scotland with all Her issue not so much as making the least mention thereof 58. Great indeed when this Will was first made was the antipathy which for the present possessed Him against the Scotch with whom then He was in actual warre though at other times when in good humour very courteous to His kinred of that extraction For most sure it is that when Margaret Douglas His Sisters Daughter was married to Math. Earle of Lenox He publickly professed That in case His own Issue failed He should be right glad some of Her body should sacceed to the Crown as it came to * Henry Lord Darly her Son Father to King James passe 59. Of the eleven Witnesses Legatees Witnesses in Kings Will. whose names are subscribed to His Will the nine first are also Legatees therein and therefore because reputed Parties not sufficient Witnesses had it been the Will of a private person But the Testaments of Princes move in an higher sphere than to take notice of such Punctilloes and forraigners being unfit to be admitted to such privacies domesticall Servants were preferred as the properest Witnesses to attest an Instrument of their Lord and Master 60. It is but just with God that He who had too much of His Will done Little of His Will performed when living should have the lesse when dead of His Testament performed The ensuing Reformation swept away the Masses and Chantery Priests founded to pray for His soul The Tombs of Henry the sixth and Edward the fourth the one the last of Lancaster the other the first of Yorke the Titles of both which Houses met in this Henry remain at this day in statu quo priùs without any amendment Where by the way seeing in this Will King Henry the sixth is styled his Uncle I cannot make out the relation in the common sence of the word except any will say that Kings Uncles as their Cousins are oft taken in a large and favourable acception But the main wherein His Will missed the intent is in that the Scotch Line neglected and omitted by Him ordinary Heirs are made in Heaven Heirs to Crowns in the Heaven of Heavens came in Their due time to the Throne Their undoubted Right thereunto recognized by Act of Parliament 61. After the making of this his Will His disease and the manner of His death He survived a full Month falling immediately sick He had sesque corpus a body and half very abdominous unweldy with fat and it was death to Him to be dieted so great His appetite and death to Him not to be dieted so great His corpulency But now all His humours repaired to one place and setled themselves in an old sore in His thigh which quickly grew to be greatly enflamed Here flame met with fire the anguish of the sore with an hot and impatient temper so that during his sickness few of His Servants durst approach His presence His Physicians giving Him over desired some who tendred the good of His soul to admonish Him of His estate But such who could flie with good tidings would not halt to Him with ill newes Besides lately a Law was made That
none should speak any thing of the King's death Which Act though onely intended to retrench the Predictions and mock-Prophesies of Southsayers yet now all the Courtiers glad of so legall a covert for their cowardise alledged it to excuse themselves to inform the King of Nis approaching end At last Sir Anthony Denny went boldly unto Him and plainly acquainted Him of His dying condition whereupon Archbishop Cranmer was by the King his desire sent for to give him some ghostly counsell and comfort 62. But before Cranmer then being at Croidon could come to Him His hope expressed by speechlesse gesture He was altogether speechlesse but not senslesse The Archbishop exhorted Him to place all His trust in Gods mercies thorough Christ and besought Him that if He could not in words He would by some signe or other testifie this His hope Who then wringed the Archbishops hand as hard as He could and shortly after expired having lived fifty five years and seven moneths Jan. 28. and thereof reigned thirty seven years nine moneths and six daies 63. As for the report of Sanders Lying Slanders that King Henry perceiving the pangs of approaching Death called for a great bowle of white wine and drinking it off should say to the company We have lost all it is enough to say it is a report of Sanders As loud a lie is it what he affirmeth that the last words heard from His mouth were The Monks the Monks and so gave up the ghost This may goe hand in hand with what another Gatholick * Rich. Hall in his Manuscript-Life of Bishop Fisher relates that a black Dog he might as truly have said a blew one lickt up His blood whilest the stench of His corps could be charmed with no embalming though indeed there was no other noysomnesse than what necessarily attendeth on any dead body of equall corpulency 64. Vices most commonly charged on His memory are His Vices and Virtues 1. Covetousness He was an eminent Instance to verifie the Observation Omnis prodigus est avarus vast His profusiveness coming a fork after a rake not only spending the great Treasure left Him by His Father but also vast wealth beside and yet ever in want and rapacious to supply the same Secondly Cruelty being scarce ever observed to pardon any Noble person whom He condemned to death I finde but two black swannes in all the currant of His Reign that tasted of His favour herein And therefore when Arthur * Godwin in Hen. 8. p. 181. Lord Lisle imprisoned and daily expecting death in the Tower was unexpectedly set free he instantly died of soddain joy so that it seems King Henry's pity proved as mortal as His cruelty Thirdly Wantonness which cannot be excused But these faults were if not over even poised with His virtues of Valour Bounty Wisdome Learning and love of Learned men scarce one Dunce wearing a Miter all His daies 65. The Monument mentioned in His Will Why K. Henry's Monument never perfected as almost made was never all made but left imperfect whereof many reasons are rendred Some impure it to the very want of workmen unable to finish it according to the exactnesse wherewith it was begun a conceit in my minde little better than scandalum seculi and very derogatory to the Art and Ingenuity of our Age. * Godwin in Hen. 8. p. 113. Others more truly ascribe it to the costlinesse thereof which deterred His Successours from finishing of it Indeed King Henry the seventh in erecting His own Monument in His Chappell at Westminster did therein set a Pattern of despair for all Posterity to imitate And yet Sanders * De schis Angl. pag. 216. tells us That Queen Mary had a great minde to make up His Tomb but durst not for fear a Catholick should seem to countenance the memory of one dying in open schism with the Church of Rome As for His imperfect Monument it was beheld like the barren Fig-tree bearing no fruit and cumbring the * Luke 13. 7. ground I mean the Chappell wherein it stood and therefore it was since these Civill Warres took down and sold by order of Parliament 66. In the Reign of Queen Mary Card. Poole his project it was reported that Cardinal Poole whose spleen generally vented it self against dead-mens bodies had a designe with the principall Clergie of England to take up and burn the body of King Henry the eighth This plot is said to be discovered by Doctor Weston * Fox Acts and Mon. p. 2102. Dean of Westminster But because Weston was justly obnoxious for his scandalous living for which at that time he stood committed to the Tower and bare a personal grudge to the Cardinal his report was the lesse credited as proceeding from revenge and desire to procure his own enlargement 67. Indeed when a Vault The bones of K. Hen. abused seven years since was pierced in the midst of the Quire at Windesor therein to interre the corps of King CHARLES they lighted on two Coffins therein Now though no memory alive could reach the same yet constant tradition seconded with a * See more hereof at the buriall of K. Charles coincidency of all signs and circumstances concluded these Coffins to contain the bones of King HENRY the eighth and His dear Queen JANE SEYMOUR And yet the bignesse of the Coffin though very great did not altogether answer that Giant-like proportion which posterity hath fancied of Him The end of the Fift Book THE Church-History OF BRITAIN THE SIXT BOOK BEING The History of Abbeys in ENGLAND Of their Originall Increase Greatnesse Decay and Dissolution To the Right Honourable WILLIAM COMPTON Sonne and Heire to the Right Honourable JAMES Baron COMPTON of COMPTON AND Earle of NORTHAMPTON HAving formerly proved at a In severall Dedicatory Epistles in my Pisgah Sight large That it is lawfull for any and expedient for me to have Infant-Patrons for my Books let me give an account why this parcell of my History was set apart for your Honour not being cast by chance but led by choice to this my Dedication First I resolved with my self to select such a Patron for this my History of Abbies whose Ancestour was not onely of credit and repute in the Reîgn but also of favour and esteem in the affection of King HENRY the Eighth Secondly he should be such if possible to be found who had no partage at all in Abbey-Lands at their dissolution that so his judgement might be unbiased in the reading hereof Both my Requisits have happily met in your Honour whose direct Ancestour Sir WILLIAM COMPTON was not onely chief Gentleman of the Bed-Chamber to the aforesaid KING but also as a noble b The Lord Herbert in his History page 8. pen writing his Life informeth us the third man in His favour in the beginning of His Reign yet had he not a shooe-latchet of Abbey-Land though nothing surely debarred him save his