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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
authority_n	according_a	church_n	word_n	2,966	5	4.1215	3	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A26737	The ancient liberty of the Britannick church, and the legitimate exemption thereof from the Roman patriarchate discoursed on four positions, and asserted / by Isaac Basier ... ; three chapters concerning the priviledges of the Britannick church, &c., selected out of a Latin manuscript, entituled, Catholico-romanus pacificus, written by F.I. Barnes ... ; translated, and published for vulgar instruction, by Ri. Watson.; De antiqua ecclesiae Britannicae libertate. English	Basier, Isaac, 1607-1676.; Barnes, John, d. 1661. Catholico-romanus pacificus. English. Selections.; Watson, Richard, 1612-1685.	1661 (1661)	Wing B1029; ESTC R9065	27,797	82

Augustine their Bishop more than with Pagans the reason was because Augustine did seem to deal uncanonically with them by constraining them to receive him for their Arch-Bishop and subject themselves to the mandates of strangers when as the Ancient manners of the Britannick Church required that all things should be synodically transacted within themselves Hence is it that the Britains did alwaies celebrate their Ordinations within themselves and this is also another honorary priviledge of the Patriarchal Jurisdiction and concerning this wee again appeal unto Bede in his history of Aidan the Bishop yea to Baronius himself where quoted before who relates out of Lanfranke the custome of the Kingdome to have been that the Bishops thereof were consecrated by one single Bishop but that these ancient Customes of Britain were abrogated by the force rather and power of the Anglo-Saxons than by any Synodical consent The said Bede testifieth the same where hee relates that Colman the Bishop Finanus's Successour in the Pontificate of the Northymbrians with his fellows chose rather to desert Episcopate and Monastery than their Ancient Manners Which fact of Bishop Colman is worth observation lest what some falsely pretend onely the Monks of Bangor may seem to have rejected Augustin against whom charged upon them this was the Legitimate defence of the ancient Britains these being their very words out of Beda before That they could not abandon their ancient manners without the consent and license of their own Bishops And truly this answer of the Britains was grounded on very irrefragable very Catholick reason and that because this unwonted subjection had contradicted the sixth Oecumenick Canon of the Council of Nice which expresly commands the Ancient Manners to bee kept This had also destroyed the eighth Canon of the first Ephesine Council by which first such usurpation to wit in the case of the Cyprian Church is called in Hypothesis a thing innovated beside Ecclesiastick Constitutions and Canons of the Holy Fathers which as common diseases therefore needs a greater remedy because the dammage is greater which it brings Secondly Therefore the Holy Synod in Thesi as they say or in general commands that that should be observed in all Dioceses and Provinces wheresoever Behold the Authentick Charter of the Britannick Liberty Thirdly That no Bishop the Roman not excepted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 should invade any other Province which from the beginning hath not been under his or his predecessours jurisdiction as for instance did Augustin the Monk Fourthly The Oecumenick Canon goes on and a hundred and fifty years more or less before Augustins invasion of the Britannick Church as it were fore-seeing it by provision declares it to be void in these most weighty words That if any one shall invade it and make it his own by force hee shall restore it Fifthly Yet further for the following words are most emphatical and which as by and by shall appear seem chiefly to regard the Roman Bishop himself The Holy Synod warneth that the Canons of the Holy Fathers be not passed by nor that the pride of secular power creep in under the specious pretence of administring sacred Affairs and by little and little unawares wee lose that Liberty which our Lord Iesus Christ the deliverer of all men hath purchased for us by his blood Yea the Holy Oecumenical Synod for the greater enforcement yet again repeats the decree It hath therefore pleased the Holy and Universal Synod to decree that to every Province be preserved pure and inviolate the rights which it had from the very beginning according to ancient Custome every Metropolitane and so the Britannick having liberty to take Copies of the Act for his Security Yet the Holy Synod concludes according to its Oecumenical Authority If any one shall bring any Sanction every word is most general repugnant to those which now are defined it hath pleased intirely the Holy and Universal Synod that it bee void Hitherto for the Liberty of the Churches extends the most express Canon of the Catholick Church which after the matter of fact first declared completes the matter of right in favour as well of the Britannick as Cyprian Church For since as out of the praemises appears the Britannick Church in the West enjoyed the same priviledge wherewith the Cyprian Church was honoured in the East why may not shee lawfully resume what is her own in time of peace which was taken from her by tumult and force in a turbulent time of the wars The sum of the whole most Inculent Canon is this The ancient and truly Catholick Church would have the rights of every Church preserved not taken away and if they be taken away by force or fraud what Patriarch soever doth it his fact is declared void and moreover hee is commanded to restore that Province which he hath made his own Now that this Canon was establisht in a tacite opposition to the Roman Bishop himself is not obscurely to bee collected out of the Acts of that Council for it is evident from them that the Canon prevailed notwithstanding the Epistle of Innocent the first to Alexander wherein the Roman Bishop declared that the Cyprians were not wise according to Faith if they subjected not themselves to the Patriarch of Antioch when as notwithstanding wee see the decree of the Universal Synod plainly contrary to the Papal sentence wherein namely it was judged that this was attempted by the Antiochian beside the Canons and that therefore all the letters brought by him against the Cyprians were of no effect Hitherto the third Position The last followeth The Fourth and last Position The Britannick Church persevering in its Primitive Exemption from the Roman Patriarchate so far is it from that it ought or can be therefore called Schismatical that rather in the very same respect before truly Catholick Iudges that Church appears both to have been and yet really to bee by so much the more every way Catholick by how much that Church more than others is an Assertour of the whole Ancient Catholick Liberty which by so many sacred Canons of four General Councils the Nicene Constantinopolitan Ephesine and Chalcedonian the Catholick Fathers have decreed and antecedently declared to remain ratified for ever against all future usurpations SInce the time that the ancient Liberty of the Britannick Church was by right resumed as before with the solemn consent of the whole Kingdome the Britannick Church now truly Catholick in the rest can by a like right retain the same without the loss of her Catholicism without any brand of Schism much less of Heresie We do willingly owe the proof of this assertion to Barns a most learned and peaceable man at the same time when hee writ it a Roman Priest a Monk in the order of the Benedictins a Britain and therefore no unfit Arbiter of this Britannick Cause First Therefore whether the causes of our withdrawing were sufficient is no way a matter of Faith but wholly

of the supream jurisdiction from the Politick Authority Therefore the Royal Power remained the same it was before both Legislative and Iudiciary as well in Sacred as Civil Affairs For Moses as King in Iesurun was constituted by God himself the keeper as well of both Trumpets as Tables now what pertained to Moses as King is every Kings due This very comparative Argument as rightly consequent from Moses to Constantine the Great after the revolutions of so many ages Eusebius five or six times applies to establish the Imperial Authority about the Convocation and confirmation of the first Nicene Council Fourthly As Moses not Aaron delivered the Ceremonial Law so long after Moses King David instituted the courses of the Priest and Solomon thrust out Abiathar the High Priest Fifthly When Christ inaugurated his Apostles hee furnished them with great powers of his own such as are the Administration of Sacraments and power of the Keyes but all that Christ bestowed on his Apostles cumulatively nought at all privatively for indeed our Lord Christ would neither by the Evangelical Priesthood nor his whole first Advent have any thing detracted from the Jurisdiction or Authority of the Civil Powers nor that Kings because Christians should have their Prerogative abated Sixthly Wee say That Kings as Kings ought to be the Liturgick Officers of Christ and so far Kings in their degree may yea ought to be Ministers of the Church and as it were External Bishops of the Ecclesiastick Government as Constantine the Great said wisely of himself That same the magnificent Title of Christ himself Prince of the Kings of the earth seems to erect for all Kings of right although in fact most of Kings are not yet by vertue of this title they are obliged all to bee Christians Seventhly We say That there are very many things pertaining to the external Polity of the Church which although they belong properly and primarily to the King alone yet in case of necessity as they say and secondarily are out of course devolved upon the Clergy For instance To call Synods ordain Fasts or Festivals distinguish Parishes into Diocesses or Provinces to fix and ratifie the Hierarchical degrees of Bishops so as this man is a Bishop that a Primate the third a Metropolitane that this Bishop should be under the jurisdiction of that Metropolitane and contrarily upon some weighty or lawful either occasion necessity or publick commodity of the Church that this should be exempt from the other under whom hee was before These and very many of like sort according to the various state of the Church pertain both to the King and Priest For those two most different times of the Church's condition ought not to be confounded I mean of persecution and peace Because in time of persecution under Infidel Kings so long as Princes are altogether and every way dis-joyned from the Church and the Church from Princes the divine order ceaseth and the Royal Succession suffer's necessarily interruption I say interruption not abolition For so long the case is plainly extraordinary and while so the Woman is in the Desart and the Church supplies this defect of Princes as she can As when the Husband is absent or sick the Matron governs the Family But the divine Positive Order re-entring the ordinary state of the Church returneth also so soon as Kings resume the Christian Religion the partition-wall presently falls down and then by due right Kings take again their exteriour power over the Christian Church Otherwise we should say that in order to the Government of the Church there ought to be no difference between Pharaoh and Moses between Nero and Constantine nor as to dominion in sacred Affairs and the right use thereof that this Emperour communicates any more with the Church than the other which would be dissonant not onely from right Reason but also from holy Scripture Therefore the Emperour so soon as hee becomes Christian ought to obtain his restitution intire And this in this Argument is the matter of right or general Reason which wee lay down as the Base of that right which belongs to the Emperour in establishing the external limits of the Ecclesiastical Government As to the matter of fact or practice that is both general or Catholick and also special The general practice beside the assumption of the second Argument which was proved before consists in an induction of Councils as well General as Provincial all which as they supplicate from the Emperour himself the very convocation of councils so do they submit to the same Emperour every one of their decrees even those in matters of Faith which although as to their intrinsec Authority they depend onely on the Word of God and Truth it self yet as to their extrinsec Authority they depend on the Imperial Sentence but if those of Faith how much more those which are onely of the bare Regiment of the Church such as is the establishment of Patriarchates lye all under the Imperial decrees to wit in this sense That the Canon of the Church may have the force of a Law that wholly proceeds from the Authority of the Prince Thence is it that every one of the Ancient Councils all the Ancient Catholick Bishops even the Bishop of Rome himself present them alwaies to the Emperour to be supplied amended perfected and so humbly petition from the Emperour not a naked protection or late execution but an intire ratification and confirmation of every Council without which as to the external effect they are to become unattired void and plainly of no force Concerning this Truth I appeal not onely to the Councils of Cavalion Mentz and Toures with the rest of the less sort but I produce the very four general Councils concerning the first of which viz. that of Nice Eusebius expresly relates that the Emperour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 confirming the decrees of the Synod did fortifie them as it were with his seal I appeal also to the first Council of Constantinople and the very Epistle of the Council to the Emperour Theodosius wherein all the holy Fathers petition the Emperour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. to have the Suffrage of the Synod confirmed Yea I appeal to Leo himself Pope of Rome whom I beleeve not to have been of the most abject spirit among those in that Pontificate who in every one of his Letters to three Emperours humbly petitions not commands much less decrees but beseecheth supplicates that the Emperour would command c. But it may suffice to have declared these things though somewhat at large yet but by the way to the evincing by a general rule from the whole to the part That the rights of Patriarchates introduced by Custome confirmed by Councils were established by Emperours 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which was the last lemme of our Position The same will appear more evidently in the special practice of the Catholick Emperours For by what Authority Iustinian the Emperour

erected Iustiniana prima to a new Patriarchate and indulged unto the same they are the words of his eleventh Novel the highest Priesthood the highest authority and ordained that that should have the place not onely Vicegerency but place of the Apostolical See so as it should be saith Nicephorus a Free Church and Head unto it self with full power c. what could be said more amply what more magnificently of Rome her self so likewise by the same Imperial Authority the very same Emperour Iustinian Novel 131. ch 1. restored the African Diocess to its Ancient Patriarchal Prerogative which the invasion of the Vandals had interrupted And so by his Imperial writ did hee constitute the Bishop of Carthage absolute Primate of whole Africk Lastly This is the very thing which in the last age the Emperour of Britain King Henry the eighth by the like right imitated in his Diocess viz. not by erecting it anew which yet in the case of Iustiniana prima Iustinian did but onely restoring the same Britannick Diocess unto the Ancient Liberty it enjoyed in the Primitive times of the Ancient Oecumenick Councils viz. the Nicene Constantinopolitane and Ephesine concerning which more hereafter And thus much more than needs of our first Position because that is as it were the foundation laid for the rest that follow The Second Position 1 The Britannick Church 2 as being alway placed without the Suburbicaries of the Italick Diocess 3 in the time of the Nicene Council was in no case subject to the Romane Patriarchate but enjoyed a Patriarchate of its own as to the substance of the thing so as did the other Churches placed in the rest of the free Diocesses The Structure or Proof TO the first wee must observe that the Britannick Diocess was one of the thirteen into which according to the computation of some the whole Roman Empire but the very Praefecture of Rome it self was anciently distributed We must also observe that the Britannick Diocess had been one of the six Diocesses of the Western Empire among which it appears to have excelled out of Tacitus Spartian and the other more famous Roman Historians To the second wee must mark that by the Nicene Council every Province had its Metropolitick bounds set Certain it is I say that therein were fixed the Ecclesiastick limits to the three chief Metropolitanes that is to the Roman Alexandrian and Antiochian the right alwaies of the other Provinces being preserved which were no way subject to these Metropolitanes It matters not whether wee call them Patriarchs or Primates the Origin of which terms as the amplitude of their office wee owe rather to the following ages whether wee call them Exarchs as the Council of Chalcedon Can. 9. or Arch-Bishops as Iustinian promiscuously or Metropolitans or onely Bishops as this very Nicen Council all is one so long as it effectually appears That by Patriarchs wee understand them to whose both ordination and jurisdiction the Provinces of intire Dioceses were attributed and who had the hearing and judging of all Ecclesiastick causes in the last reference so that according to Iustinian the Emperour yea according to the very Oecumenick Council of Chalcedon from the Patriarchal sentence out of Council was allowed no regular appeal Wee call with the Lawyers those Suburbicary Provinces which were concluded in one Diocese the Law term because of the manifest coextension of both being translated from the Republick to the Church Thirdly Let us grant which yet is undetermined that the Roman Patriarch had obtained an extraordinary or Patriarchal Jurisdiction over all the Provinces of the Italick Diocese as his Suburbicaries and that they were those ten in number viz. the three Islands of Sicilie Corsica and Sardinia and the seven other placed on the Continent Which ten Provinces some do assign to the same Diocese induced by that ancient Observation from which it appears that the Ecclesiastick Jurisdiction of the Dioceses both for the beauty and benefit of order and unity as also to insinuate a mutual harmony which ought as much as may be to be cherished between the Church and Republick in a certain accurate imitation was so coextended with and adjusted to the temporal Regiment of the secular Vicars that the Ecclesiastick Patriarchates or Primacies were not enlarged farther than the temporal Jurisdiction of the Vicars that is to the limits of those Dioceses the Cities whereof in which resided the Vicars were Metropolies where was fixed the Praetory it self which was the highest Tribunal of all causes and all appeals likewise in the Provinces subject thereunto The very same government of the Church was retained for the conservation of Ecclesiastick Unity unto which was had special regard by that singular and excellent subordination of the lesser Clerks to their Bishops in every City of the Bishops unto their Metropolitanes in every Province and of the Metropolitanes to their Patriarchs in every Diocese But in case either of Heresie or Schism the Church was succoured by Councils either Provincial which were rightly called by the Metropolitane or Patriarchal which by the Patriarch or lastly general which by the Emperour himself Now as this premised general coextension of the Ecclesiastick Jurisdiction with the Civil Government appears by comparing the second Canon of the Constantinopolitan Council with the very Code of the Provinces so that particular definition of the Italick Diocese may bee fetcht out of Ruffinus the best Interpreter of that very sixth Nicene Canon who expresly mentions the Suburbicaries in that place where he professedly interprets the said Canon who being both an Italian and near the age of the Nicene Council was able clearly to distinguish the proper limits as then fixed of the Italick Patriarchate Howsoever it is evident to any man that even in this sense from the Jurisdiction of all those ten Italick Provinces as Penitus loto divisos orbe Britannos From the whole world the Britains were divided To the fourth viz. That in the time of the Nicene Council the Britannick Diocese was subject neither to the Roman Patriarchate as some of yesterday grosly suppose nor yet to any forein Jurisdiction shall presently appear when wee shall shew That the Britannick Churches enjoyed their own Primate or Patriarch That being all matter of fact is to be fetched out of the Britannick history it self which is written by Venerable Bede the chief Historiographer of the said Britain and a Catholick Priest too In him therefore wee may read the huge difference of the Britannick Church howsoever most Catholick in other things from that I say not with the same Bede contrariety to the Roman Church both in the different observation of Easter wherein the Britains following the use of Anatolius the Constantinopolitane Patriarch and not that of the Bishop of Rome conformed themselves to the Eastern not Western Churches as also in the different administration of holy Baptism and in many other things witness Augustin himself who