Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
authority_n	absolute_a	king_n	law_n	2,395	5	5.2952	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A38407	Englands monarch, or, A conviction and refutation by the common law, of those false principles and insinuating flatteries of Albericus delivered by way of disputation, and after published, and dedicated to our dread soveraigne King James, in which he laboureth to prove by the civill law, our prince to be an absolute monarch and to have a free and arbitrary power over the lives and estates of his people : together with a generall confutation (and that grounded upon certaine principles taken by some of their owne profession) of all absolute monarchy.		1644 (1644)	Wing E2997; ESTC R10980	14,794	18

Kings that is the supreame Princes who are free from the Law which is saith he of an absolute power and this is not subject either to the rules of necessity or publique Law Then he saies that there is potestas extraordinaria libera an extraordinary and free power which he saies in England wee doe signifie by the name Regiae Praerogativae of the Royall Prerogative And further he sayes That the interpreters of their Law doe commonly write that there is a double power in a Prince the one ordinary bound by the Law the other extraordinary free from the Law and hee saies that they define that to be the absolute power by which hee may take away another mans right though it be great and that without a cause too Is this that extraordinary power which we by the Law of England call the Royall Prerogative I wonder at the madnesse and the ignorance of the Author that should publish a thing so absolutely contrary to the knowne Lawes of the Realme but I will refute him by our Law and not by rayling though he deserves no better First that our King according to their own definition is not one of these supreame Princes or absolute Monarches nothing more pregnant or plainely demonstrable in our Law For hee is under the Law and so saies Bracton and Fleta two of our ancientest Law Bookes in severall places commonly knowne so that I neede not to cite them But Bracton goes further Bracton de acquirendo rerum Domino fol. 34. that not onely habet legem superiorem the Law is above him but also curiam suam viz. Comites Barones c. which can bee understood of no other then the Parliament that that likewise is above him why then if both Law Parliament be above him he can be no absolute Monarch according to themselves But further by the Lawes and constitutions of this Kingdome the Legislative power doth not reside in the King alone for he cannot create a Law or destroy or disanull any Law by his Patent or Proclamation but in the three estates joyntly together assembled in one body in Parliament and therefore to maintaine our Prince to be an obsolute Monarch is utterly to oppose and overthrow the fundamentalls of our Lawe But how satte this is laboured at this day I leave it to the consciences of al honest men to judge for if the King might have power to discontinue Parliaments as long as he pleaseth or being called to have a negative Voyce to all their reasonable demands will not this bee a compendious way to bring all the Legislative power into his owne hands But then he sais that by this extraordinary or absolute power which he would have our Prince to have He may take away any mans right be it never so great For he sayes Page 13. That the Prince by his Empire possesses all things that he hath an imperiall and universall dominion though the particular and private be in the proprietor Which in plainer English is to tell you that the King hath an interest and power over every mans particular property which is as absolutely false as can be imagined and stands as much in opposition to our Law as one contrary can to another for what then would become of our Petition of Right Or how could we say that we had right to any thing when the King at his owne pleasure might dispossesse us of all this were a ready way to inslave us and to make us hould by that base tenure of Villeinage I do not denie but that the Common wealth hath an interest paramount the property of every private man but this is not left to the sole disposition of our Prince but the Parliament who may dispose of the generall interest for the good of the Common wealth and in such case we our selves are the free dispensers of our owne for t is not more their power then our owne consents that binds us But thankes be to God that every man by our Law let Court Parasites say what they will hath as absolute a right in that hee enjoyes as his Prince claimes in his Crowne nay I may be bold to affirme without prejudice to the royall interest that he hath a greater for that the King is seised or possessed in the right of his Crowne onely the people in their owne right What one principle more aumenticke in our law then this that the King cannot take away any mans property without his owne consent and how is this consent to be purchased why no otherwise then by Act of Parliament with whom the generall property which is above every mans particular interest is intrusted And therefore those that will have the King to be an absolute Monarch over his people must instruct him how to repeale Magna charta and all the other Lawes made in confirmation of it and the Subjects liberty before they can court them into slavery But here it will be objected that the lawes of this Realme doe avow and maintaine our King to be an absolute Monarch very just and with this difference wee shall allow him to be so that is as to all forraine power authority or jurisdiction what soever he is an obsolute Emperor within these his dominions in plainer language he is no dependent or tributary Prince but is as he is acknowledged to be by the statute of 24. H. 8. ca. 12 Furnished with plenary whole and intire power preeminence authority prerogative and jurisdistion c. So that no forraine Prince or Potentate whatsoever can challenge or excercise the least authority in these Kingdomes but this doth no way conclude our Prince to be an absolute Monarch in the excercise of his jurisdiction over his people T is true that my Lord Coke sayes our King is an absolute King but how not over his people and that is cleared by the case that he puts which is this Artold King of Manne sued to King H. 3. to come into England c. upon which my Lord Coke observes Lib. 7. fo 21. that seeing that Artold King of Manne sued for a licence in this case to our King it proveth him an absolute King which is evident as to any forraine power or authority whatsoever but not to his own Subjects For as to them he hath but a qualified limitted power confined to the rules of law the customs of his Kingdome These things pondered on I stand amazed at thy brasen confidence Albericus that durst affirme our King to be an absolute Monarch and canst prove it no better then by the daubing principles of the Civill Law what else is this but to argue a case at Common Law upon the notions and grounds of the Civil which were an absurdity next to madnesse But I stand most astonished when I consider that our Prince must be made the Patron of such dangerous absurde principles This is that that hath so much advanced Prerogative and depressed Liberty And these times are become the