Canons of the most General Councils have been confirmed by the Civil Power and confirmed at the Instance and Petition of the Synods themselves * P. 80. And from hence he infers therefore that their Definitions are no farther Obligatory than as they are ratified by the Civil Authority †P. 79. And this Point he is so sure of that he conceives it to be allowed on all hands whereas I on the contrary conceive that it is allowed on no hands and is a Conclusion I am-sure that neither agrees with the Principles of our Church nor can ever be drawn from the Premisses on which he pretends to establish it If this Doctrine be good then is that of our Twentieth Article stark naught which determines that the Church hath Power to decree Rites or Ceremonies and Authority in Matters of Faith But how has she Power and Authority to this purpose if her Synodical Decisions are in no case farther Obligatory than as they are ratified by the Civil Authority The Magistrate at this rate will have Power but the Church her self can have none For she speaks only by her Synods in matters of this nature and if therefore her Synodical Decrees have not any Authority of their own till confirmed by the Prince then under an Heathen or Heretical Prince the Church has not I say any Authority tho' the Article expresly says that she has It is very observable that Dr. Wake has not in either of his Books mentioned this Article which yet surely in a Controversie of this nature deserved to have been taken notice of Such an Omission could not be by chance and we must believe therefore that he is of the Opinion of those Back-friends of ours in Charles the First 's time who would allow the former part of the Article no more Authority than Dr. Wake allows to the Church but said it was deceitfully inserted by Archbishop Laud and wanting in the Original He might be ashamed to take up with this Reproach after that Solemn Appeal which the Archbishop in his Speech in the Star-chamber * Anno 1637. See Heylin 's Life of Laud p. 339. made to the Records of Convocation for the disproof of it If he have any Suspicions still left in this matter my Lord of Sarum in his Late Exposition †P. 26. will clear them In the mean time let me put him in mind of the Fate of Dr. Mocket's Book de Doctrinâ Politeiâ Ecclesiae Anglicanae ‖ In 4 to London 1617. which tho' writ by Archbishop Abbot's direction yet was Burned publickly and that chiefly on the account of this very Omission if Dr. Heylin's History ⸫ Life of Laud p. 76 may be relyed on But how comes he to dream it to be allowed on all Hands that Synodical Definitions are no farther Obligatory than they are ratified by the Civil Power What Church upon Earth ever determined or allowed this Doctrine Because the Fathers of many Synods desir'd the Prince under whose Direction they met to inforce their Decrees by Civil Sanctions and Penalties does it follow that therefore these Decrees without the Addition of the Civil Sanction would have had no Authority no Force to oblige the Consciences of Christians Does the Subsequent Authority destroy the force of the precedent one Is the one of these lost and swallowed up in the other At this rate what will become of Excommunication when confirmed as it is here with us by a Civil Penalty Has the Church Sentence in this case no Authority because the Writ de Excommunicat◠capiendo is linked to it and issues out upon it Such arguing would have become a Disciple of Erastus much better than a Son of the Church of England But he will tell me Canons lose no Authority in this case which they ever had because indeed they never had any the Great Priviledge of the Church being only to prepare Draughts of Canons and Dead Matter as it were for the Royal Stamp afterwards to put Life into But if so How shall we account for the Acts of Church-power exercised by Synods from the first Planting of the Christian Religion till the Empire turned Christian It is plain that the Governours of the Church for three hundred years before the Civil Power came in to assist them met in Synods and made Laws which were universally submitted to not only as Councils or Advices proceeding from Men whose Character was had in great Reverence but as the Commands of Lawful Superiors towards their Spiritual Subjects and as such they were understood to oblige the Consciences of all good Christians in those Ages And if they had such an Authority before Constantine's time how came they to want it afterwards As the Church could get no New Power by coming under the Protection of the State so how does it appear that she lost any Old one The Emperors indeed by turning Christians gained something to wit an Interest in the management of Ecclesiastical Affairs but their Gains were not built on the Church-Governours Losses the Power that by this means accrued to 'em was Accumulative not Privative i. e. it gave them some Authority which they had not but it took not that away which the Spiritual Pastors and Governours had A Distinction that I am not afraid to make use of notwithstanding the Quarter it comes from If Dr. Wake therefore denies the Definitions of Synods held under the Civil Power to have any other Authority than what they derive from that Power he by consequence denies that the Anti◠Nicene Fathers assembled in Synod had any Right to prescribe Rules to those Christians that lived within the District over which they presided or that those Christians were bound to obey 'em He affirms in effect the several Canons that these Assemblies passed the Censures that they pronounced all the Acts of Synodical Authority which they exercised to be in themselves Null and Void and mere Usurpations upon the Liberty of Christians And whether he will take up with these Scandalous Notions or not we shall see when he blesses the World with his Next Performance Sure I am that without 'em his Scheme cannot be consistent and of a piece Agen Dr. Wake is also very faulty on this Head when in order to depress the Power of the Church he promiscuosly enumerates all the Laws framed by Princes about Ecclesiastical Affairs without informing us which of those Laws only traced the steps of precedent Canons and which of them proposed New Matter of Obedience beside or contrary to those Canons which would in this case have been a very Material and Pertinent Distinction He is full of the Edicts relating to Church-matters that are to be met with in the Code of Theodosius the Code and Novels of Iustinian c. * P. 11. But it would have been very honest of him here to have told us as the Truth is that there were scarce any of these Edicts to which some Canon had not
see an Instance of such a License practised and we may observe therefore how nearly he traces the Synodical Form in the third Position where the Quae decernenda censuerit is plainly taken from the Decernendum censemus we meet with in the Canons of 1597 and which I have already observ'd to be the highest Expression of Authority us'd by That P. 388. or any other of our Synods that treated without a Commission Dr. Zouch rely'd implicitly on Cousins's Tables and from them thus interpolated transcrib'd these Positions Verbatim into his Descriptio Iuris Iudicii Ecclesiastici and therefore this is no new Authority The Resolutions of the Iudges 8 vo Iac. in my Lord Cokes XII th Report have somewhat more of Authority in them But these also are calculated to the Course that had been taken 1 o. Iacobi and which perhaps my Lord Coke himself might have directed neither do they oppose the Interpretation that has been given of the Statute if we look narrowly into them they are to this purpose 1. A Convocation cannot Assemble without the Assent of the King 2. After their Assembly they cannot confer to constitute any Canons without License from the King 3. When upon conference they conclude any Canons yet they cannot execute them without the Royal Assent It is not said here that they cannot confer about Canons which the Tables grosly affirm and Dr. W by placing the Comma between Confer and Constitute †See p. 108. would â—ain insinuate but only that they cannot confer to constitute which is very true if the meaning of the words be that they cannot so confer as to constitute and that this sense was intended by the Judges appears from their Third Resolution where the Phrase is thus vary'd When upon Conference they conclude I submit to their Opinion that the Convocation cannot confer to constitute that is as they explain themselves upon Conference conclude Canons and I infer from hence that neither the Submission-Act nor the License in 1603. can fairly be extended to a further sense and that this is the utmost Râ—straint which the Clergy now lie under Dr. W. seems to have been sensible of this and has produc'd these Resolutions therefore not at once but by Piece-meal craftily dividing the second from the third and placing them at a convenient distance †See p. 108 129. that we might not have the Opportunity of explaining the One by the Other L. M. P. has dealt more fairly and aboveboard for he has cited all Three of them together †P. 38. though at the Evident Hazard of their appearing by that means to be nothing to his purpose And to give a further strength to these Decisions he adds That Godolphin cites and admits them in his Repâ—rtorium Canonicum a Book which Dr. W. having mention'd with the utmost Contempt ‖ P. 275. 't is much that one who comes after him on the same side should urge as good Authority The Dr. pitty poor Godolphin for depending on Sir E. Coke in a matter of Antiquity the Letter-writer brings this very Godolphin to confirm St. E. Coke's Opinion in a Point of Law so little are they ageeed upon the Character and Credit of their Witnesses Poor as he is Dr. W. it seems has a Friend yet poorer than He who would not else have vouchsafed to borrow from him But why Poor Godolphin he was as rich in Learning as his little Gleanings could make him a Collector and a Scribler and how then comes Dr. W. to despise him Methinks We second-hand Writers should learn to speak more respectfully of one another because if We our selves do not it is probable no body else will Let Godolphin's Character be what it will Dr. Wake could not have taken a more unlucky occasion of undervaluing him than he at present makes use of If I stop a little to state the Case between them I hope I shall have the Pardon of my Reader Godolphin had said that Church Gemot denoted antiently what we call a Convocation and vouch'd Sir Edward Coke for it the Letter to a Convotion-Man had asserted the same thing though without citing any Authority Dr. W. who is deeply learn'd in these Researches insults them all Three upon this suppos'd mistake and with a scornful Air tells his Adversary I am confident be will be hard put to it to bring us any Author elder than Sir E. Coke from whom as Poor Godolphin first so as he now taken it at all adventures †P. 275. What Authority that Gentleman had or had not in his View I cannot say for That I am sure would be to speak at all Adventures since He himself vouches none But that there is an Authority for this Elder than Sir E. Coke's and that Dr. W's Confidence therefore misled him when he pretended to be sure there was none I can safely affirm For the Learned Sir H. Spelman has said this very thing and repeated it at least four several times * In the words Gemotum Haligemot and Chirchgemot and not there only but again in his Reliquiae too where he has translated the passage in H. the I's Laws into English thus And whomsoever the Church-Synod shall find at Variance let them either make an accord between them in Love or sequester them by their Sentence of Excommunication p. 54. in the 1 st that is the most Authentick part of his Glossary which came out in 1626. many Years before the IV th Book of Institutes appear'd abroad in the World From Him my Lord Coke probably had it for he quotes I find the very same Passage for it out of the Laws of H. the I. †Quoscunque Chirchgemot discordantes inveniâ—t vel Amore congreget vel sequestret Judicio c. 7. where Sir Henry's Transcript read Cyricgemot instead of Scyresmot as Wheelock afterwards from the Exchequer Manuscript it self Printed it ‖ P. 180. This seems to be the Correcter Reading however I dare not determine it so to be because Sir H. Spelman I find had the perusal of two other Manuscripts beside that of the Exchequer and Wheelock's Edition whether rightly Copied in this Instance or no yet is in several other respects faulty particularly in the very next words to those Sir H. quotes there is a manifest mistake for instead of Debet utem Scyresmot Burgemotis Hundreda vel Wapentachia duodecies in anno Congregari Sex diebus anted submotum which in the Margin is Summonitionem we ought to read Debet autem Scyresmot Burgmot â—is Hundreda Wapentachia duodecies c. 7 diebus anteâ summoniri as the Passage is read in the Laws of E. the Confessor †Pp. 147.148 from whence these of H. the I. were taken But which soever of these be the true reading we have Sir H. Spelman's word for it that Chirchgemot is a good Saxon word and did in that Language signify a Synod or Convocation Had he not known it
willing to spend some time in Prayer before we begin I am Sir Your Affectionate Brother and Servant in the Lord W. F. III. See p. 87. 1. ANd as concerning the requiring of your Highnesses Royal Assent to the Authorising of such Laws as have been by Our Predecessors or shall be made by Us in such Points and Articles as we have by God Authority to rule and order by Provisions and Laws We knowing Your Highnesses Wisdom Vertue and Learning nothing doubt but the same perceiveth how the granting thereunto dependeth not upon our Will and Liberty and that We your most humble Subjects may not submit the Execution of our Charges and Duty certainly prescrib'd by God to Your Highnesses Assent although in very deed the same is most worthy for Your most Princely and Excellent Vertues not only to give your Royal Assent but also to Devise and Command what we should for good Order and Manner provide in the Church Nevertheless considering we may not so in such sort restrain the doing of our Office in the feeding and ruling Christ's People Your Graces Subjects We most humbly desire your Grace as as the same hath done heretofore so from henceforth to shew Your Graces Mind and Opinion to us what Your Highnesses Wisdom shall think Convenient which We shall most gladly hear and follow if it shall please God to imspire us so to do with all submission and Humility beseeching the same following the steps of Your most Noble Progenitors and conformable to Your own Acts to maintain and defend such Laws and Ordinances as We according to our Calling and by the Authority of God shall for his Honor make to the Edification of Vertue and Maintaining Christ's Faith whereof Your Highness is Defender in Name and hath been hitherto in Deed a Special Protector Bibl. Cotton Cleop. F. 1. fol. 96. II. Forasmuch as the Answer lately made by Your Clergy unto Your Honorable Commons for their satisfaction in their Bill of Complaint put up unto Your Highness doth not please nor satisfy Your Highness in some Points concerning Your Own particular Interest specially in that Point which concerneth Laws either Now to be by Us made or else Old to be by Us reform'd for Your Highnesses better Contentation in that behalf We Your said most Humble Chaplains do now more especially answer unto those Points as followeth 1. As touching New Laws to be by us Hereafter made we say that the Laws and Declarations of Christ's Holy Church throughout all Christian Realms receiv'd and us'd been clear and manifest that the Prelates of the same Church have a special Jurisdiction and Judicial Power to Rule and Govern in Faith and Good Manners necessary to the Souls health the Flocks unto their Care committed and that they have Authority to meet and ordain Rules and Laws tending to that purpose which Rules and Laws hath and doth take effect in binding all Christian People as of theymself so that before God there needeth not of necessity any Temporal Power or Consent to concur with the same by the Way of Authority Item they say that this Power and Authority in making Laws in matters concerning the Faith and Good Manners necessary to the Soul's health all Christian Princes hath hitherto reckon'd themselves bound to suffer the Prelates to use within their Realms and have not claimed of the same Prelates that they should from time to time require their Consent or License by the way of Authority more in making of such Laws than they do claim that they the said Prelates should from time to time require their Consents autorysable in the giving of Holy Orders to any of their Subjects or in the exercising any other Spiritual Act depending upon their Spiritual Jurisdiction the Authority whereof immediately proceedeth from God and from no Power or Consent Authorisable of any Secular Prince except it be that Consent that is taken of the Princes own submission to the Faith Catholique made not only by their Noble Progenitors when they first admitted Christ's Faith and the Laws of the Holy Church within their Realms but also by themselves first Generally at their Baptism and after more specially and most Commonly by their Corporal Oaths at their Coronation We say also that this Power of making Laws aforesaid is right well founded in many Places of Holy Scripture now so much the less necessary here to be rehears'd for as much as that matter is at large set out in a Book now by Us put up unto Your Highness and Your Highness your self in your Own Book most excellently Written against M. Luther for the defence of the Catholick Faith and Christ's Church doth not only knowledge and confess but also with most Vehement and Inexpugnable Reasons and Authoritys doth defend the same Which Your Highnesses Book we reckon that of Your Honor You cannot and of Your Goodness You will not revoke Yet these Considerations notwithstanding We your most humble Chaplains and Bedesmen considering Your High Wisdom Great Learning and Unfeign'd Goodness towards Us and the Church and having special Trust in the same and not minding to fall into Contentions or Disputations with your Highness in any Manner of Matter what we may do We be contented to make Promise unto Your Highness That in all such Acts Laws and Ordinances as upon Your Lay Subjects We by the reason of our Spiritual Jurisdiction and Judicial Power shall hereafter make we shall not Publish nor put them forth except first we require Your Highness to give your Consent and Authority unto them and so shall from Time to Time suspend all such our Acts Ordinances and Laws hereafter to be made unto such Time as Your Highness by Your Consent and Authority shall have authoris'd the same except they be such as shall concern the maintenance of the Faith and Good Manners in Christ's Church and such as shall be for the Reformation and Correction of sin after the Commandments of Allmighty God according to such Laws of the Church and laudable Customs as hath been heretofore made and hitherto receiv'd and us'd within Your Realm In which Points our Trust is and in most humble manner we desire Your Grace that it may so be that upon the Refusal of Your Consent which We presume that we need not fear but yet if any such thing should fall Your Highness will be then contented we may exercise our Jurisdiction as far as it shall be thought necessary unto us for the maintenance of Christ's Faith and for the Reformation of Sin according to our Offices and the Vocations that God hath call'd us unto As for the Second Part concerning Laws that in Time past hath been made by us or by our Predecessors contrary to the Laws of this Your Realm and to your Prerogative as it is pretended to this Point We Your Highnesses most humble Chaplains answer and say that such our Laws by our Predecessors within this Realm made as contain any matter contrary to your Laws or
from Eusebius * L. 5. c. 23 24. St. Cyprian †Ubique and ‖ De Jejun c. 13. Tertullian They were necessary for deciding the Differences that might happen between one Diocese and another or between those of the same Diocese if they could not be composed at home for the maintenance of sound Doctrine and wholsome Discipline and for the promoting of the general good of Christianity The Authoritative part of these Meetings was compos'd of the Bishops and Presbyters who sat * Conc. Eliberit in Proaem Greg. L. 4. Ep. 44. 4. Conc. Tolet. Capit. 3. Cypr. Ep. 1. Graviter commoti sumus Ego Collegae mei qui praesentes aderant Compresbyteri nostri qui nobis assidebant the Bishops in a Semi-circle formost and the Presbyters behind them before whom the Deacons and the People stood being little more than Witnesses of what pass'd at the Synod The Presbytery were in every City a necessary standing Council to their respective Bishops whose Power in the Church was much like that of a King in one of our mix'd Monarchies and together with their Bishops therefore they met in a Diocesan Synod upon all great Causes and without their Advice and Consent nothing of Importance was or could be determin'd This was the settl'd Rule of the Primitive Church and was kept up to here in England when it had declin'd almost every where else as the Constitutions of Egbert * Can. 44 45 46 47 apud Spelman Conc. T. 1. p. 258. Arch-Bishop of York made in the middle of the Eighth Century declare And some Remains of this Ancient Discipline are yet visible in those Capitular Bodies planted in our Cathedral Churches who as they were Originally intended to be a Select Presbytery to the Bishop for all the Affairs of his Diocese so have they still a Restraint upon his Authority in several Cases by the known Customs of this Church and Laws of the Realm Some of their Presbyters the Bishops were oblig'd to carry along with 'em to the Council of the Province and there I say they Sat Deliberated and Voted upon all Matters that came before the Assembly Indeed to General Councils the Inferior Clergy came not ordinarily in their Own Right but as the Proxy's only of absent Bishops which was necessary to hinder those Meetings from being too numerous and to prevent Confusion However even the Bishops that were present in General Councils were deputed thither by Provincial Synods * See the Emperor's Letter to St. Cyril Conc. Ephes. Part I. as also The Epistle of Capreolus Bishop of Carthage excusing himself for sending no Bishops because the War which had broke out in those parts hindred him from calling â— Provincial Synod from whence they were to be deputed Ib. pars 2. Act. 1. and brought along with them the Resolution and Consent of the several Churches from which they came and the Presbyters therefore having Voices in those lesser Synods their Consent was also in the Definitions of the Greater presum'd and included In one of these Provincial Synods held in the Second or Third Century was that which is since call'd the 37th Apostolick Canon fram'd which orders that there shall be two of these Assemblies yearly one in Spring and the other in Autumn The same thing with some small variety as to the exact time of Meeting was by the Great Council of Nice decreed more solemnly * Can. 5. and their Decree enforc'd by the Council of Antioch †Can. 20. first and then by the Fourth General Council at Chalcedon ⸫ Can. 19. Afterwards by reason of the difficulty of convening in times of War and Confusion these Synods were order'd to meet but once a Year by the Sixth ‖ Can. 8. and Seventh General Councils * Can. 6. in the East and this Order was renewed here in the West by the Fourth great Lateran Council held under Innocent III. at the beginning of the Thirteenth Century * Can. 6. And thus the general Law of the Church stood in succeeding times as to Us at least For the Decree of the Council of Basil †Sess. 15. which made these Meetings Triennial was not I think received here in England The Rule set by these General Councils ‖ All of â—em but â—hat at Antioch reputed such was prescrib'd also by the Roman Law * Justinian Nov. 123. c. 10.137 c. 4. received into the Capitulars of Charles the Great in Germany †Lib. 1. Tit. 13. and provided for very early by special Canons in the Churches of Spain and France ‖ 3. Conc. Tolet. c. 18. Conc. Regiens c. 7. 1. Conc. Araus c. 29. 2. Conc. Aurel. c. 2. 2. Conc. Turon c. 1. and of those lesser Kingdoms that arose out of the Ruines of the Roman Empire and particularly here in England by a Canon of the Council of Herudford ⸫ Beda I. 4. c. 5. Placuit convenire nos juxta morem Canonum Venerabilium held Anno 673 under Theodore Arch-Bishop of Canterbury and which took care not only to establish the Practice for the future but also to affirm the ancient Usage it being at the very entrance of the Acts of it expresly said to assemble in Vertue of the Old Canons as it was held also much about the Time that those Old Canons prescrib'd †Sept. 24. The Lateran Canon that reviv'd the use of Yearly Provincial Assemblies was in force here as Iohn de Athon tells us ‖ Proaem Othob tho' not so well observed he says as it ought to have been for a Reason too reflecting to be ⸫ Qualia Concilia Provincialia singulis annis celebrari ponitur sub praecepto quod non est ergo negligendum Sed hodiè de facto praetermittitur quia fortè Lucrum Bursale Praelatis non acquiritur sed potiùs tùnc Expensae apponuntur He gives I find the same free Reason in another place for the neglect of some Provincial Constitutions De facto perrarò servantur quando servando Constitutionem Bursae Praelatorum vacuarentur Sed aliae Constitutiones quae Praelatis Bursales sunt satis memoriae commendantur exequuntur ad unguem Ad Constit. de Hab. Cler. Englished This must be understood of the time when Athon wrote which was somewhat above an hundred Years after * For Pitts 's Account which has been taken all along upon trust viz. that he Flourished in 1290 must be a mistake since Athon was made Prebend of Lincoln in 1329 and died in 1350 as I find by unquestionable Authorities when in France also it was grown into neglect as appears by Durandus's Complaint †De modo Conc. Gen. cel Rubr. 11. But at first no doubt both here and elsewhere it was more strictly kept and to it we owe that Body of Provincial Constitutions which we have the earliest of 'em those of Stephen Langton bearing Date 1222 a few Years after that
drawn up and presented M. Par. Addit p. 199. But afterwards in the 20 E. 2. the Archbishop having called a Convocation to meet at London in Quind Mich. and the King a Great Council at the same time at Sarum a Writ went out to the Archbishop in this Form Vos rogamus ex affectu Vobis nihilominùs in fide dilectione quibus nobis teâ—emini firmiter injungentes and upon this he Prorogued the Convocation for a Fortnight When therefore Archbishop Stratford †An. 1341. held a Provincial Council on purpose to oppose some Arbitrary Proceedings of Edward the IIId who pretended by the Advice of his Great Council only to Revoke what had been Enacted in Parliament we find not that the King forbad the Assembly but only their Treating and Agreeing of such things as were to the hurt of his Prerogative Royal Prohibitions of this kind were sent to every Bishop of the Province Tested on the same day with the Writ of Revocation to the Sheriff which is Printed very unbecomingly I think with our Statutes and one of these Forms for the Honour of that Archbishop and the relation it has to the Point we are upon I shall present the Reader with in the Appendix * See Numb I. The King had also his Proctors †Pat. 37. H. 3. m. 19. apud Pryn. Eccl. Jurisd T. 2. p. 807. or Commissioners sometimes in these Meetings who Proposed Protested and Appealed on his behalf but they were ever Men in Holy Orders His great Lay Lords and Ministers indeed carried frequently his Commands thither but none staid there ‖ 21. H. 3. Concilio jam incaepto missi sunt ex parte Domini Regis Comes Lincoln Johannes Johannes Filius Galfridi Will de Rale Canonicus S. Pauli ut dicto Legato ex partâ— Regis Regni inhiberent ne ibi contra RegiÌ„am Coronam Dignitatem aliquid Statuere attentaret Et remansit ibi ut hoc observaretur Will. de Rale indutus Cappâ Canonicali Supellicio aliis recedentibus M. Par. p. 378 to Act for him but Clergy-men only Though sometimes the King himself has vouchsafed to Appear and Sit in Convocation as in Arundel's ⸪ In Conv. habitâ 23 Jul. 1408. in Causâ Unionis Register Henry the IVth is once remembred to have done In these Assemblies the Gravamina Cleri or Articuli Reformationis were constantly expected from the Lower House and ran so high sometimes as to propose Reformanda per Dominum Papam per Archiepiscopum Suffraganeos per Convocationem per Parliamentum And Solicitors were Appointed to prosecute such Reformations in Parliament These the Organum Vocis suae their Prolocutor or Referendarius exhibited in a Schedule and their Petitions had answers as those of the Commons were used to have from the King anciently Harpsfield and Antiquitates Britannicae afford us many Instances of this Kind but the Manuscript Acts of those Synods more and this is one of them Inter alia propositum fuit à Clero ut Episcopi dignentur Canones executioni mandare Imprimis de Professionibus vestris quòd legantur coram vobis ad minùs bis in Anno. 2. De Visitationibus 3. De Residentiâ Regimine Episcoporum 4. De Regimine Gestu Vestitu Familiarium vostrorum Which Instance is not given so much for the Articles as for the Answer to them Omnia ista sunt â—romissa statuta ac concessa fiet Executio â—er quemlibet ad quem pertinet prout respondebit â—oram Deo proximo Concilio Provinciali * Regist. Arundel And â—n that very Convocation which submitted to H. the VIII the Lower House as dispirited as they were took heart to complain to the Upper of the Practice of some Bishops in those â—ays who took Bonds of Resignation of all the Clerks they preferred in their Dioceses in â—rder as they said to oblige them to Resiâ—ence †Item petunt quod Praesentati ad Ecclesiasticum Beneficium non arâ—entur per Dioecesanos Scripto aliquo Obligatorio aut Poenâ Tempoâ—li ad Residentiam Acta Conv. incaeptae Nov. 5. 1529. in â—ess 91. The End was very good but the Means was thought unjustifiable and the Clerâ—y in Convocation therefore thought it worth â—â—eir while to endeavour a Redress though I â—nd not whether they effected it or what Answer was return'd But among all their Grievances I have never â—bservâ—d the want of Convocations mention'd 〈◊〉 one of them The Clergy indeed complain some times of their being called together too often and kept sitting too long and beg a Dismission and the Archbishop excuses himself frequently on that Head in his very Letter of Summons But I have seen no Intimation any where that they wanted an opportunity of Meeting which is a certain sign that they never wanted one never I believe from Anselm's days who by the favour of H. the Ist. reviv'd those Meetings that had been suppressed by W. the IId * Concilium non permisit Rufus celebrari in Regno suo ex quo Rex factus est jam per 13 Annos says Anselm to Pope Paschal L. 3. Ep. 46. And what the Consequence of this Intermission was the Synod which met at the beginning of H. I. declares Multis verò annis Synodali Culturâ cessante viciorum vepribus succrescentibus Christianae Religionis Fervor in Anglia nimis refrixerat Eadmer p. 67. down to the very times that we live in No more than this needs be said to furnish the Reader with an Account of Provincial Synods and their Rights as allowed and practised in this Realm Such an Account I mean as is necessary to set the General part of this Dispute in a true Light and to lead the way to matter which is more Pertinent and Particular and which I shall go on to suggest after I have added a Reflection or two that arise from what has been already delivered It is plain that the Power lodged in the Metropolitan of calling together such Members of his Province is likewise accompanied with a Right in those of his Province to be so called and that the Vis Praecepti of which Atho speaks †In Proaem Othob lies as well upon the Superior as on his Inferiors The Bishops for Instance having as much Right by the Canon Law to demand such a Meeting for the Good of the Church as the Metropolitan has Authority to Assemble it and the Obligation running reciprocally though the Power does not It is indeed not so much a Power as a Trust that is lodged in him and for which therefore by the Ancient Canons of the Church * 7. Gen. Conc. Can. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Canonicis poenis Subjiciatur and by the Imperial Law †Nov. 123. c. 10 he was made accountable 'T is in this case as in that of our great Lay Conventions the Assembling of which is not only part of the Prince's Prerogative but of the
inform his Readers what Opposition it met with from the Clergy e'er it pass'd I have seen the Iournal of that Synod it is not so Large indeed as those Records of Convocation which Heylin saw Reformat justified Sect. 2. and wherein he says the whole Debate with all the Traverses and Emergent Difficulties which appear'd therein are specify'd at large However it is particular enough to shew with what Difficulty and by what steps the Clergy were drawn into a Complyance and how Threatning Messages were sent 'em by the King before they could be brought to it And I have already from another Manuscript promis'd the Reader the several Forms of Submission which they drew up one after another but could not get accepted There is no Reason therefore to complain of want of Light in this case for perhaps there is scarce any one thing done in any of H. the 8 th's Convocations of which we have a clearer and fuller account than of the Opposition which the Court-Form of Submission met with from the Clergy before they came up to it From the Inferior Clergy I mean for it does not appear that the Prelates were so very hard to be dealt with On the contrary it is said in the Acts that but one Bishop and not one Abbot or Prior disagreed to it but of the Lower Clergy 18 or 19 Voted against it to the very last and 7. or 8. referr'd that is Voted neither against it nor for it See Troub Try of Laâ—d p. 82. may be drawn to import by the Ambiguous Relation of the word Attempt as it now stands there yet the Parliament it is plain would take it and accordingly Enacted it in no other sense than I have given of it distinctly severing it in the Body of the Act from all those words that have any respect to the Making of a Canon and confining it to that Branch of the Sentence which suspends all the Old Canons already made Then comes the other Branch which prescribes the Method of making new ones and forbids the Clergy to Enact Promulge or Execute any without the King's Assent leaving them in the mean time to their Old Methods of Proposing and Deliberating and reducing their Power only to the same Level with that of Parliaments over which they had before great and sensible advantages in as much as they Enacted Canons by their own Authority without the Royal Concurrence and in Synods oftentimes which met without a Royal Summons This I question not is the true and genuine Exposition of the Act and this being the very Hinge on which the Second Article of the Dispute turns I thought my self oblig'd to consider it with a very particular care and to secure it if possible against all Exceptions I hope I have done so and that the Reader is by this time fully satisfy'd that no Restraint is laid by it upon any Convocational Act of the Clergy previous to the passing a Canon but that they have still as much Liberty to Treat Debate and Conclude so they do not Enact Promulge and Execute since this Statute as ever they had before it Sure I am that it has been thus understood all along by those who may be presum'd to be best acquainted with its meaning such as Poulton and Rastal were The one in his Abridgement puts this Title before the Act That the Clergy in their Convocations shall Enact no Constitutions without the King's Assent The other in his Repertory at the End of the Statutes makes this to be the Purport of it That the Clergy in their Convocations shall Enact nothing unless they have the King's Assent and License Neither of 'em were aware it seems that their Liberty of Debate was cut off by it My Lord Herbert took it just as they did for his short Summary of it is that in Convocations nothing shall be Promulg'd and Executed without the King's Leave * P. 399. Mr. Fox was of the same mind for thus he abridges it That the Clergy shall not hereafter presume to assemble in their Convocation without the King 's Writ or to Enact or Execute Constitutions without his Royal Assent †Vol. 2. p. 330. Bishop Godwyn does not differ in his account of it which is In praedicto porrò Parliamento decretum est de abrogandâ— Synodi Authoritate in Canonibus Ecclesiasticis condendis nisi quatenus Rex eos ratos habuisset * Annal. ad Ann. 1534. Francis Mason the Eminent Defender of our Orders represents it after the very same manner in a small Piece of his about the Authority of the Church in making Canons and Constitutions concerning things Indifferent There he says It is Enacted by the Authority of Parliament that the Convocation shall be assembled always by vertue of the King 's Writ and that their Canons shall not be put in Execution unless they be approv'd by the Royal Assent †P. 15. Nor had the Enemies of the Church any other Opinion in this matter than its Friends witness what the same Author in his Great Work mentions as the sense of the whole Body of the Puritans Ostendunt Puritani sub sinem sui Examinis Canones prorsus nullos vigere aut valere in Angliâ qui Regio Calculo ac Sigillo non sunt muniti * Fitz-Simon apud Masonum de Minist Angl. p. 21. And thus speaks one of them in a Treatise of Oaths exacted by Ordinaries c. and He no inconsiderable Writer It is Enacted he says and Provided that no Constitutions or Ordinances should be made or put in Execution within this Realm until c. †P. 54. Nay thus speaks Mr. Bagshaw himself in his famous Argument concerning the Canons where we may be sure he says nothing more to the advantage of the Clergy than he needs must and yet he represents the Act to be only that to the making of Canons there must be the King 's Royal Assent * P. 12. And when he is to produce the words of the Statute by which the Clergy have power to make Canons he says they are That they shall not Enact Promulge or Execute any Canons or Constitutions c. unless they may have the King 's most Royal Assent to Make Promulge and Execute the same †Ibid. But as to Attempting Alledging Claiming and putting in Ure he never dreamt that These were in the Act apply'd or were applicable to this purpose and therefore does not mention them Intruth he was a Lawyer and a Man of Skill in his Profession and so knew very well that in the Omission of these words as having no reference to the Clergy's Power of making Canons he only trac'd the steps of the King's Commissions to the Convocationâ— in 1603 and 1640. One of these is Printed at length in the * P. 285 290. Bibliotheca Regia and there All of the 25 H. 8. which relates to the Clergy's Power in Making Canons is inserted at large and which is
being oppos'd or understood since That it self would be a Misfortune to 'em tho' they were sure to have it quash'd elswhere The Bishops Interest Authority Eloquence 〈…〉 sufficient to plead the Churches 〈◊〉 and secure her Interests in the House of Lords where all the Noble Members are under so favourable a Disposition towards Her that they would certainly do Her Justice tho' they were sollicited by less Powerful Advocates However the Commons Spiritual think it very Proper and Reasonable that they should in these cases have a Recourse to the Commons Temporal whose Interests in the State running parallel with Theirs in the Church and being nearly linkâ—d with them seem mightily to encourage such an Application and to make it a Point of Prudence as well as Duty in the Clergy to practise it where it may be had The Commons have a considerable Interest in the Lesser Clergy by reason of their Patronage They are their Protectors and Guardians appointed by Law in relation to one part of their Maintenance and will be extremely tender therefore of all their other Civil or Ecclesiastical Rights and careful to cover them from any Attempts that shall be made upon their Priviledges That so they may be in Heart and at Hand always to stand up with them in behalf of Liberty when it shall be attack'd and to resist a Growing Tyranny either in Church or State as it may happen For Arbitrary Government is a Spreading and Contagious Thing and when once it is set up any where there is no knowing where it will end My Lords the Bishops therefore must excuse us if as great a Reverence as we bear to their Characters and as high an Esteem as we have of their Personal Qualifications their Integrity Capacity Courage yet we think it fit that other Helps should be call'd in since All Helps are but little enough to support the sinking Interests of Religion and the Clergy and judge the Great Concerns of the Church no where so secure as where the Wisdom of our Constitution has lodg'd 'em in the Hands of a Convocation of the Province We know the Enemies of the Church sleep not tho' the Watchmen sleep too often are the words of one once an Active Presbyter of this Church now a Vigilant Prelate * Dr. Burnet 's Fast-Sermon before the House of Commons Anno 1681. p. 25. We cannot God be thanked apply 'em to the Present Bench of Bishops and would not if we could unless in a Case of the Utmost Necessity because nothing less than that would justifie such a freedom in Meaner Authors However Times may come that will deserve such Language but when if the Provincial Assemblies of the Church be together with its Watchmen laid asleep it will be too late to use it The Right Reverend Author of that Discourse who should understand the Frame of our Church well having written the History of it observes that it is happily Constituted between the Extremes of Ecclesiastical Tyranny on the one Hand and Enthusiastical Principles on the other Hand †Ibid p. 9. It is so and the Happiness of this Constitution in relation to one of these Extremes lyes in the Interest which the Lower Clergy have in Convocation where they are associated with their Lordships in the Care and Government of the Church Whereas out of Convocation they are not I think advis'd with and have little else to do but to observe Orders The Diocesan Synods of our Church being not for Counsel now but for the Exercise of the Episcopal Authority This Happy Frame therefore should by all means be kept up and the rather because it suits very happily with that of the State and with the Constitution of Parliaments And it is highly expedient for every Church and State that the Ecclesiastical Polity should be adapted to the Civil as nearly as is consistent with the Original Plan of Church-Government which in our Case there will be no danger of departing from by a Compliance with the State-Modell For I am sure and am ready when ever I am call'd upon particularly to prove that the more our Church shall resemble the State in her Temper and Manner of Government the nearer still will she approach to Primitive Practice and the nearer she comes up to Both these the more likely will she be to Endure and Flourish What the same Eminent Pen has said on this Occasion I willingly subscribe to That as in Civil Government a Prince governing by Law and having high Prerogatives by which he may do all the Good he has a mind to which yet he cannot abuse to act against the Law and who is oblig'd often to consult with his People in what relates to common safety by whose Assistance he must be enabled to put in Execution the Good Things he designs is certainly the best Expedient for preventing the Two Extremes in Civil Society Confusion and Slavery So a Bishop that shall have the Chief Inspection over those whom he is to Ordain and over the Labours of those already plac'd whom he shall direct and assist in every thing and who governs himself by the Rules of the Primitive Church and by the Advice of his Brethren is the likeliest Instrument both for propagating and preserving the Christian Religion * Pref. to the Hist. of the Regal I add and for the keeping up of this Particular Church in some Degree of Repute and Authority which have ever been best secur'd to it when her Prime Pastors have met their Clergy often in Synod and by their Advice and Assistance manag'd the Great Affairs of it But if that be thought too much and sound too high for the Lower Orders to pretend to who must be contented rather to be the Subjects of Ecclesiastical Government than any Sharers in it yet even Subjects themselves may Petition and make known whatever Grievances or Requests they have to offer without Encroachment on any of their Superiors And that the Liberty of such Addresses and Representations is still left to the Convocation to the Lower House alone or to Both joyntly I have fully shew'd The Statute of Submission even under the most Rigorous Interpretation of it being scarce pretended to abridge their Priviledges in this respect And because Practice in this kind is the best Proof I shall here add a few Instances of it In the Convocation of 1542 33 Hen. 8. the Acts say that at the passing of the Subsidy Clerus exposuit 4. Petitiones to the Upper House who when they presented the Subsidy were to acquaint the King with them 1. De Legibus Ecclesiasticis condendis 2. De Conjugiis factis in Bethlehem abolendis 3. De veneundis Beneficiis 4. De Decimis solvendis Act. MSS. Sess. 20. The Two Petitions in the first Convocation of E. 6. See 'em in Bishop Burnet's Hist. Vol. 1. p. 118. Collect. of Records whatever force they may have to prove a License necessary on other Occasions which shall hereafter be fully
some Late Writers pretending to answer the Letter to a Convocation Man particularly by the Author of a Letter to a Member of Parliament and by Dr. Wake in his Book intitled The Authority of Christian Princes over their Ecclesiastical Synods asserted c. This Book being written by a Person of some Station in the Church and as is pretended under the Cover of a Great Authority deserves to be examined with a more than ordinary care which accordingly I have resolved to bestow upon it Dr. Wake indeed has a Peculiar Talent at enlarging on a Controversie the shortest Point when it comes under his Fruitful Pen immediately improves into a Volume I shall not so far follow his Example as to trace all he has said step by step and Page by Page and take every Opportunity that he has given me of laying open his misapplied Reading and mistaken Reasonings That would be an Endless Task which I have no leisure for neither does the Cause require it nor would the Reader bear it I shall endeavour therefore as much as I am able to shorten this Debate and in order to it shall first of all make some General Reflections upon his way of managing it wherein I shall shew how very little there is in his Tedious Work that really concerns the Point disputed and how much of it is written against no body and for no End in the World that I can see but the Pleasure of Emptying his Common-Place-Book I may very aptly apply to him what Bishop Andrews said of a much Greater Adversary Etsi nobis lis nulla de Regiâ in Ecclesiasticis Potestate tamen exorari non potest Tortus quin in Campum exeat istius Controversiae ubi quaestio nobis nulla de eâ re ostendat tamen nobis Testes minimè necessarios Explicare scilicet voluit Opes suas ostendere quae habebat in Adversariis suis. Habebat autem ad hanc rem nonnulla si incidisset alicubi Iam quia non incidit occasionem arripit non valdè idoneam ea quoquo modo proferendi Vult enim Lectorem videre quà m Cupressum pingat eleganter * Tortura Torti p. 169 I shall not I hope be thought impertinent in displaying these Impertinences of his which I shall do in as narrow a compass and under as few Heads of Observation as the variety of the matter will admit of And I. I observe that Dr. Wake has put himself to a great deal of needless pains to prove a Point which he might if he pleased have taken for granted that every Christian Prince and Ours in particular has an Ecclesiastical Supremacy and that the Clergy are not by a Divine Right intitled to transact Church-affairs in Synods as they please and as often as they please without any regard to the Civil Christian Power that they live under Many of those numerous Instances he has produced of Princes intermedling with Church-matters here at home or abroad are designed only to assert this Great Truth which however is a Point that he needed not to have laboured so heartily because no Church of England man ever denied it not the Man he writes against I am sure who says only and what he says I shall not fear to say after him that the Civil and Spiritual Powers are distinct in their End and Nature Lett. to a Conv. Man pp. 17 18. and therefore ought to be so in their Exercise too The One relates to the Peace Order Health and Prosperity of the Man in this Life as a Sociable Creature the other concerns his Eternal State and his Thoughts Words and Actions preparative thereto The first is common to all Societies whether Pagan or Christian the Latter can rightly be exercised among Christians only and among them not as inclosed within any Civil State or Community but as Members of a Spiritual Society of which Iesus Christ is the Head who has also given out Laws and appointed a standing Succession of Officers under himself for the Government of this Society And these Ministers of his did actually govern it by these Powers committed to them from him for near 300 years before any Government was Christian. From whence says he it follows that such Spiritual Iurisdiction cannot be in its nature necessarily dependent on the Temporal for then it could never have been lawfully exercised till Kings States and Potentates became Christian. And agen in another place This Power having been claimed and exercised by the Apostles and their Successors without any Regard nay in Opposition to the Heathen Temporal Authority is therefore we say not necessarily in its own nature dependent on such Authority †P. 19 20. Than which Reasoning nothing certainly can be more just nor could that Writer have expressed himself with more Caution and Guard upon so nice an Occasion Dr. Wake seems here to have apprehended him as if he had affirm'd that Princes have nothing to do in Church-matters the Management of which lyes without their Sphere and no ways depends on Their Authority But no Man living could have struck this sense out of his words that was not either very Blind or very willing for some small End or other to misunderstand him Cannot this mighty Controvertist distinguish between Denying the Exercise of Ecclesiastical Power to be necessarily dependent on the Temporal and affirming it to be necessarily independent upon it Does he not see a difference between saying that the Church may subsist without the State and that the State has nothing to do in the Government of the Church If he does not he ought to forbear tampering in Disputes of this kind till his Judgment is better and his Head clearer But if seeing this difference he yet resolved to take no notice of it either because he had made Collections some time of his Life about the Supremacy and was resolved to take this Opportunity of giving himself the Credit of them or because he saw it would be of use to him to have the Writer he appears against represented under as Invidious Colours and his Opinions loaded with as much weight as was possible if this were the Case it must be allowed him that there was some little Art tho' I think no very great share of Honesty in his Management 'T is true the Letter to a Convocation-man immediately after the last words I transcribed from it adds And if we should say further that this Society has an Inherent and Unalterable Right to the Exercise of this Power it would be no more than what every Sect or Party among us claims and practises c. But Dr. Wake could not with any colour lay hold of this Passage as asserting the Independency of the Church on the State for besides that it is only a way of arguing drawn from other Mens Principles it is a few Lines afterwards expresly retracted and qualifyed But this says he is what at the present we neither do nor need say Notwithstanding which Dr.
Wake is resolved that this he shall say and maintain and supposing it therefore to be his avow'd Opinion draws down all his strength and sets his Quotations in Array against it From Fathers and Councils from Antient and Modern Writers our Own and Foreign Historians he learnedly proves that the Church-power in a Christian Commonwealth is to be exercised in Subordination to the State that Princes have of right all along called Councels and dissolved them have hindred the Execution of some Ecclesiastical Canons which were prejudicial to their Kingdom and given the Civil Sanction to others and a great deal more of this kind they have and may do and must be allowed therefore a Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Affairs and over Ecclesiastical Persons And what if they be Is there a Line in that Book he opposes but what will stand good notwithstanding all this were made out never so irrefragably This is bringing the Great Engines of Battery against a Place which he might have marched directly into without Opposition 〈◊〉 Enemy having never undertaken to defend 〈◊〉 Qui operosè probant c. says Grotius or some such sly Dealers in this very Controversy stultum sibi fingunt Adversarium de quo facilè triumphent * De Imp. Summar Pot. circa Sacra Dr. Wake with great Modesty advises his Learned Adversary Not to increase the Necessary Bulk of their Dispute by alledging passages out of the Antient Fathers to prove that which neither of 'em make any doubt of †Appeal Pref. p. XXI Had he given this Advice first to Himself and taken it his Huge Performance had shrunk away into a few Pages and been as inconsiderable for its Bulk as it is for the Importance of the matter contained in it II. A second Instance wherein Dr. Wake has spent his Learned Pains to no purpose is in the Tedious Account he has given us of the Power exercised by Princes in relation to General Councils and the Greater Church-Assemblies These Researches as he calls 'em might well have been spar'd upon a double account both because the matter of 'em lyes not very deep and can be no News to any Man that has but once touched on this Controversy ‖ Veteramenta omnia detrita jam repetita millies says Bishop Andrews Tort. Tort. p. 173. of some of those very Instances which 90 Years ago it seems were grown stale tho Dr. Wake produces 'em now with such Pomp and Pleasure and because his Reading of this kind tho' never so hard to come at yet is nothing to the purpose For the Dispute turns on Provincial Synods only and the Rights which the Church lays claim to in relation to Them and it is no Proof or Disproof of these Rights to shew what the Practice of Princes has been in convening and presiding over General Councils which are Meetings of another Nature and Original and subject to quite different Laws and Usages By Provincial Councils the Church was govern'd and in such Councils all the Great Affairs of it were transacted for some hundreds of Years before the Empire became Christian whereas General Councils owe their very Being to the Civil Power without the Express Allowance and Encouragement of which after Christianity had once spread it self wide they never did or could assemble The Times when Provincial Synods were to meet the Persons that were to compose them and preside in them the Causes that were to come before them and the manner of deciding those Causes and of enforcing Obedience to their Decisions by Spiritual Censures c. these were all things fully agreed on and determin'd by the Rules of the Church while it subsisted independently of the State and when Constantine therefore by embracing the Faith became its Protector he only confirm'd those Antient Usages to the Church which she was in possession of He left the Practice of the Church just as he found it only what was before an Ecclesiastical Rule he made a Civil Right and a Law of the Empire Not so as to General Councils the Church had no Custom no Prescription to plead in relation to Them they were Then first to be set up by the Civil Power framed and moulded * L. M. P. Proves a Convocation not to be incident to a National Church by a passage in the Preface to Aelfricus 's Canons where he finds it said that the Christian Church for the first 300 years had no Convocation p. 46. Can one imagin it possible for a Man to be in the Dark to that Degree as not to know that this was meant of General Councils But his Skill in Ecclesiastical History it seems goes no further than Lambert and no wonder therefore if the Method of their Meeting and Acting was regulated in some of its chief Circumstances by that Power which gave Birth and Establishment to them The First of these Assemblies that ever sat provided by a Canon for the continuance of Provincial Synods upon the Foot they had always stood and this Canon was reinforced by several succeeding General Councils was ratified by the several Emperors in whose Times these Councils were held and inserted at last into the Code of the Imperial Laws and from thenceforth the Synod of every Province was as Legal an Assembly as the Senate it self had a right at stated Times to be Summoned as duly and to act within its proper Sphere as freely as any Civil Convention whatever But General Councils even after they were set up were not by any Law thus provided for they were in their nature and Institution Occasional Meetings which had no fixed time allotted to them but were to be called together in Extraordinary Cases only and when the Pressing Exigences of the Church required them And no Bishop Then pretending to an Authority over All the Rest even on that account it fell acourse to the Emperors share to Convene them The Assembling of so many Men of Rank and Character from so many Quarters of the Empire was a Power that could safely be lodg'd in no Hands but his that rul'd it He was to be Judge when such a vast Confluence was fit to be allow'd and how far it consisted with the Peace of the State at what Place and Time the Session should be opened and how long it should continue He by his Officers provided for the safe Conduct of the Fathers going to the Council and returning from it at his Expence they had Reception and Entertainment on the way and under the Security of his Protection they met and consulted The Debates of such a Numerous Assembly must have been very disorderly and tumultuous unless conducted by a Rule which no single Bishop had a Right to prescribe to the rest and which could not therefore come so properly from any one as from Him that Summon'd them And that this Rule might be sure to be observ'd it was requisite that the Emperour should have a Place in their Assembly should preside over
and moderate their Debates either in Person or by his Deputies as he saw occasion After the Fathers had come to Resolutions and framed their Canons it was of vast Importance to 'em to have the Secular Power ratifie what they had agreed on They could Authoritatively declare what was the General Sense of the Church on such and such Articles but to procure that these Decisions should be generally received and obeyed in all Christian Countries could no ways be so effectually brought about as by Civil Sanctions and Penalties On all these accounts and many more it was highly reasonable and just nay necessary almost that the Imperial Power should exert it self in Appointing the Meetings and Governing the Debates and Confirming the Acts of General Councils But was there the same Reason and Necessity for its interposing as particularly in Provincial Synods also which were Ordinary Meetings of perpetual and standing Use in the Church not Numerous or Composed of Equals but of Persons living at no Great Distance from one another and all Subordinate to one Ecclesiastical Superior Dr. Wake knows in his Conscience that these Circumstances make a Wide Difference between them and if so why does he amuse us with Large Accounts of what Emperors have done and been allowed to do in relation to those Great and Extraordinary Meetings the Custom of which makes neither for nor against the Rule that was to be observed in these Ordinary Stated ones To what purpose was it for him nauseously to transcribe Labbée for fifty Pages together upon a Common-place which has been so often and so thoroughly exhausted by the Writers of the Last Age and which besides is of no manner of use towards determining the present Dispute Does he think to cover the want of proper and apposite matter by such loose and General Reflections as these Does he hope to make his Readers lose sight of the Point they are in quest of in that Mist of Impertinent Quotations with which he surrounds ' em The Learned Mr. Hill had rightly observed that what Dr. Wake produces * P. 10. from Socrates †Hist. Eccl. Praef. l. iv about the Emperor's interposing in the Greatest Councils was of no weight in the present Argument where we are enquiring what the Usage and Rights of the Church are not in the Greater but Lesser Synods which go by quite another Rule and are much more exempt from the Interposition of the Civil Authority Dr. Wake makes a Scornful mention of this Distinction in the Preface to his Appeal * P. xxi without vouchsafing to give any Reply to it which was discreetly done for it would not admit of any The Distinction is just and well applyed and had it been considered by Dr. Wake when he wrote must have prevailed with him to withdraw above half the History that his first Chapter is filled with and have made that part of his Work look no more Learned than it really is Socrates might well say that the Greatest Synods were held always at the Emperor's Direction but he knew the Lesser were not and therefore omitted the mention of them And the same Caution is observed in one of our XXXIX Articles †Art 21. where it is affirmed indeed that General Councils may not be gather'd upon any Occasion in any Circumstances without the Commandment and Will of Princes But of Provincial Councils nothing is said However the Churches Caution in Wording her Decision is not greater than Dr. Wake 's in citing it who has thoughout his first Book made as I remember but one slight and General mention ‖ P. 10. of this Article without producing the words of it which he knew would go near to suggest a Distinction that it was not to his purpose to have observed Indeed the Canons of 1640 seem and only seem to go further for in truth they do not Art 1. They affirm that the Power of calling both National and Provincial Councils is the true Right of all Christian Kings within their own Realms and Territories but say not that this is the Right of Kings alone so that no other Person or Persons can in any Circumstances whatever claim or use it on the contrary they plainly teach that where the Prince is not Christian the Prelates of the Church may rightfully use this Power so it be with Submission to the Civil Penalties and Punishments that may attend 'em on that account and they intimate the Case to be the same under a Christian Persecuting Prince tho' it was not so Decent openly to express it The Canon and the Article therefore are perfectly consistent and both are drawn up with that Moderation and Guard as to give the Prince what is His Due and yet not to deprive the Church of what may be Hers but to leave the way open to the Exercise of the same Power that she claimed and practised before Princes came in to the Faith if there should ever be the fame Occasion for it which I hope there never will And this Canon too was not it seems thought worthy to accompany Dr. Wake 's Other Collections where Foreign and far fetched Authorities take up his Pen so much that he had not room to consider what had been said here at Home upon the Subject no not in a Work written on purpose to clear and to assert the Doctrine of the Church of England But we are not to wonder at it for the same Happy Talent of Mind which makes a Man abound in what is Trivial makes him Defective also in what is Material All that Dr. Wake can say for his way of arguing is that he has in it traced the Steps of some of our Greatest Writers who treating of the Supremacy derive the Proofs of it from the same Sources he has done and frequently give Instances of the Powers exercised by Princes over the Greatest and most General Assemblies as appears from that Collection of Authorities which he has made in his Appeal But this will not justifie him for those Writers whose Pattern he pretends to follow had to do with such Adversaries as quite shut out the Civil Power from interposing in Church-matters Most of 'em being engag'd either against the professed Defenders of the Papacy as Iewel Bilson Nowell Mason c. or against those of the Rigid Presbyterial way as Whitgift Hooker Bancroft Bramhall c. were In Opposition to these therefore it was proper to shew how far the Practice of the first Christian Emperors was consistent with such Principles And whether their Instances to this purpose were taken from the Greater or Lesser Church-meetings from Provincial or General Councils it was all one to the point in hand and made equally against Those whose Doctrine they were to disprove Not so in Dr. Wake 's Case who when he wrote his First Book had no such Adversary to deal with but One who argued altogether upon the Bottom of a Civil Right and drew his Plea purely from our
Point he would have set aside all those Instances of Provincial Councils Summoned by Princes where those Princes exerted their Power only to make Metropolitans who were remiss do their Duty and obey the Canons or where they interposed only to revive the Use of such Meetings which had been under a long Discontinuance in their Kingdoms and when they had done so lest them afterwards to their Ordinary Course In these Cases whatever the Prince did he did in behalf of the Churches Rights and his Act ought not therefore to be alledged and cannot fairly be construed to their prejudice Nay in the most Ordinary and Regular Assemblies of the Province should any mention be made in their Acts of their Meeting by the Civil Authority yet it ought to be considered whether at the same Time and in the same Acts their Right of meeting by the Canons also be not claimed For if it be the Exercise of the Regal Power in such Instances is no Bar to those Liberties of the Church which are at the same time expresly asserted and maintained Kings may order their Bishops to meet when those Bishops would have met tho' unordered and all therefore that such Bishops when met could do to secure their Ecclesiastical Right of Meeting was to mention it together with the Royal Precept and this we may presume 'em purposely to have done to prevent those Precedents being drawn into Consequence and under a Prudent Foresight of the Ill Uses that might be made of them by such Betrayers of the Church-Rights as our Author in Future Ages These Circumstances should have been considered by him and where they take place in any of the Instances of Provincial Councils he alledges acknowledged But it was not agreeable either to his Design or his Temper to enquire into matters thus carefully or to state 'em thus candidly and fairly It was enough if upon a Superficial View of the Acts of Provincial Synods or those that passed for such he found at the Entrance of any of 'em a mention of the Royal Power This he knew would have the Look of a Proof and whether it had more than that he knew not and cared not and hoped other People would not give themselves the Trouble to enquire To come to Particulars The First Instance he has produced of the Authority of Princes over Provincial Synods is this When Theodoret says he began to be busie in calling the Bishops together Theodosius not only laid a Prohibition upon him but confined him to Cyrus his own little See as a Punishment for what he had done before P. 18. I question whether Dr. Wake ever gave himself the Trouble of reading those three Epistles * Epist. 79 80 81. which he cites on this occasion tho' not with right Numbers For there he would have found that Theodoret when thus prohibited by the Emperor was at Antioch where he had no more Authority to call the Bishops together than at Rome or Constantinople He had been called up thither from his Little See to reside with Iohn the Patriarch and whatever of this kind he did therefore he did by his Order and as his Substitute But Theodosius finding the Peace of the East hazarded by these Assemblies and the Nestorian Heresie favoured by them sent an Order to Theodoret upon whose Advice the Patriarch acted to retire to his own Diocese and live there This is the true account of that matter which how it makes for or against any Point in Dispute between Dr. Wake and his Adversaries is to me hard to apprehend The next Provincial Synod he mentions is that of Agatha called by Caesarius Bishop of Arles but not says the Dr. till he had obtain'd the Consent of Alaric the Goth for it and it is expresly noted that it was held by his Allowance †P. 20. What if it were was it not a mighty favour that thirty five Catholick Bishops for so many were present ‖ Vide Conc. Meld c 73 should be allowed to meet under an Arian Prince tho' the Rules of the Church were on their side and was not this favour fit to be acknowledged in their Acts especially since at the same time they took care to assert their Ecclesiastical Right to such Meetings and to ordain * Can. 71. that for the future in obedience to the Canons Provincial Synods should be held yearly The Permission of the Prince would be sufficiently accounted for this way had this Synod been both Ordinary and Provincial but it was really neither not Ordinary for it was called after a long Intermission of Councils in those parts to restore the Decayed Discipline of the Church not Provincial for De Marca has observed * L.VI. c. 17. §. 1. that no less than five Metropolitans and the Proxy of a sixth subscribe to it But the Doctor found it styled Provincial in the Tomes of the Councils and he look'd no further Such another Provincial Council is the very next he insists on †Ibid. p. 20. that of Epaon it was composed of the Bishops of Two Distinct Provinces those of Vienne under their Archbishop Avitus and of Lyons under Viventiolus as the Subscriptions if he had not been too much in hast would have informed him Among the Spanish Councils he meets with Two that were Provincial the Synods of Narbonne and Saragosa and of both these he tells us it is said that they met according to the Order of Recaredus Pag. 23. But by his favour this is said of neither In that of Narbonne they affirm ‖ Concilia Sanctorum Patrum vel Decreta observare cum timore Dei cupientes Nos in Urbe Narbonî secundum quod Sancta Synodus per ordinationem Gloriosissimi nostri Recaredi Regis in urbe Toletanâ finivit in unum convenimus themselves to meet in vertue of the Antient Canons and of the Decree of the third Council of Toledo which met by Recaredus's order In that of Saragosa they own themselves indeed to meet by the Permission but not by the Order of Recaredus and this Permission might be and probably was no more than what was contained in the Canon of that Council of Toledo which had revived the use of Provincial Synods in Spain but just before and the Acts of which Recaredus had confirmed In Gallicia he finds the Second Synod of Braga which was Provincial to have assembled at the Command of Arianirus * P. 23. It did so but it must be considered that no Synod had been held in those parts for many years before †Diu est says the Metropolitan in his Speech by which he opened it Sanctissimi Fratres quòd secundum Instituta Venerabilium Canonum Decreta Catholicae Apostolicae Disciplinae desiderabamus Sacerdotalem inter nos fieri debere Conventum quia non solùm Ecclesiasticis Regulis Ordinibus opportunum est sed stabilem etiam semper efficit Charitatis Fraternae Concordiam dum
perpetual Law of the Church I do not wrong him in representing this as the Design of that large Historical Account of the Authority of Princes over their Councils which he has given us for besides that he must either have had this design or none nothing less than this being of any service to that side of the Debate which he espouses Besides this I say the very Terms in which he expresses himself shew this to be the true and only End he aims at Tho' Pag. 34 says he the Council of Nice first and after that several other Councils provided for the constant meeting of Provincial Synods every year and these being allowed of by the Emperors and other Princes who confirmed those Canons and approved of what they had defined may seem to have put these kind of Synods at least out of their power yet even in These we find 'em still continuing to exercise their Authority and not suffering even such Councils to be held without their Leave or against their Consent To confirm which he produces two o◠three Stories which I have shewn to be utterly wide of the mark and then concludes So intirely has the assembling of these Provincial Synods been looked upon to depend on the Will and Authority of the Christian Prince * P. 36. A Conclusion that has no Premisses nor any one clear and full Instance in all his Long Beadroll of Councils to support it The Doctor had kindly prepared us in his Preface to expect Digressions but withal promised us in his nice manner that they should be rather not directly to the purpose than altogether distant from it However I find not that he has kept his word with us or that they deserve to be thus gently dealt with In the first of 'em that meets me here I have shewn nine parts in ten of it i. e. whatever he has said about General Councils to be altogether distant from the purpose and that the other poor Scantling about Provincial Synods which seems to be yet is really not to the purpose and I conclude therefore that the whole is not only not directly to the purpose but altogether distant from it The Doctor must forgive me if I tell him that these Historical Unedifying Accounts of his put me in mind of the Honest Confession of William Caxton the Chronicler the words of which will become Dr. Wake 's mouth as well every whit as they did His and I cannot help thinking that I hear him in the close of his first Chapter thus addressing himself to his Reader Yf I cowde says he have founde mee storyes I wolde have sette in it moo but the substaunce that I can fynde and knowe I have shortly sette theim in this boke prayeinge all theym that see this symple werke of myne to pardon me of my symple writynge And indeed I for my part should have been very ready so to do had it been as Harmless as it is Simple and were it not likely as Simple as it is to be produced hereafter for a Testimony against the Churches Rights if it be not now opposed and disowned For which reason how Simple soever the performance is it deserves to be examined and I go on therefore to observe IV. That Dr. Wake distinguishes not between the Powers in Fact exercised by Princes and those of Right belonging to them by vertue of their Office Good Princes have been allowed often to extend their Authority in Spirituals very far and Ill Princes have often usurped an Authority beyond what they were intitled to Dr. Wake troubles not himself with these Considerations but what ever Powers he can find any Prince whether Good or Bad to have exercised over the Church Those he proposes as Patterns which all other Princes may safely copy and as the true Bounds and Measures of the Royal Supremacy When in the Story of our Convocations some Acts of theirs come cross him that he does not like then his Maxim is That they did take upon them to do this is no proof that they had a Right to do it * P. 296. But the most Extravagant Pretentions of Princes in the Ordering Church-matters are admitted by him without any such Guard or Distinction without considering Who it was that did this or that and in what Circumstances and for what Reasons they were submitted to in the doing it Charlemagne in Germany and Recaredus in Spain ordered Ecclesiastical Affairs with a very high hand and had certainly somewhat more than their Share came to in the management of them But this was tacitly yielded to by their Bishops who saw that to whatever Degree their Power was carried it would all be employed for the Establishment of the Church and Advancement of the Christian Religion What They did therefore must not because they did it be presently presumed to be the Common Right of every Christian Ruler but oftentimes an Instance only of a Discreet Complyance in the Clergy with such Intrenchments on the Liberties of the Church as might redound to the benefit of it Good Princes who had the Hearts of their People and were known to be intirely in their Interests have been permitted to carry their Prerogative in Civil Matters to an heigth that has been withstood and retrenched in more suspected Reigns Were the Measure of our English Constitution to be taken from those Excesses of Regal Power which have been winked at sometimes when well employed what would become of the Liberty of the Subject or the Freedom of Parliaments Dr. Wake finds perhaps in the Acts of some Councils Expressions of Great Duty and Respect used to Pious Princes by their Clergy These presently he lays hold of as Authentick Synodical Decisions The Council of Tours it seems did once upon a Time tell Charles the Emperor * See p. 92. that they left their Decrees to Him to do what he pleased with them and the Council of Arles begged him if he thought fit to amend and alter them †Ibid. This is Handle enough for Dr. Wake to annex such an Altering Power to the Kingly Character and to represent the Business of Synods to be only the preparing of matter for the Royal Stamp which may be improved corrected enlarged shorten'd at the Prince's Pleasure as in p. 84 and 85. of his Honest Performance he is pleased to express himself and therein to intitle the King de Iure to a more Extravagant Authority than ever the Pope himself I believe with all his Plenitude of Power de facto exercised or claimed But surely this is a Doctrine of too great Importance to be established on so slight a bottom and of such dangerous consequence to the Church that nothing less than the Universal Practice of the Church can sufficiently authorize it The Doctor may remember when he wrote against Prayers for the Dead in a late Reign his way of arguing was that Doctrines of that weight were not to be built on the Figurative Apostrophe's and Rhetorical
before-hand led the way and that All therefore that those Princes generally did was to re-enact by the Civil what had been before enacted by the Ecclesiastical Authority and to give the Church Decisions more weight and force by inserting 'em into the Body of the Imperial Laws and annexing further Penalties to the Breach of them This is so certain and known a Truth that even at this day we can point out the several Canons upon which almost all the Civil Constitutions of those Princes were founded and in which the matter of 'em was either particularly and in Terms or at large and in general determined And if in some few Instances we should not be able to do this what wonder is it when it is considered at what a Vast Distance of Time we live from the first Rise of these things and how many Antient Church-Monuments that would have given light in these matters have in the course of so many Ages perished Iustinian in his Laws appeals frequently to the Canons and professes to follow them * Nov. 6. c. 1. Ibid. §. 8. Nov. 58. sub finem Nov. 123. c. 36. And by this Pattern the French and German Princes in after-times framed their Capitularies taking the Subjects of them from the Resolutions of antecedent Synods †Decrevimus juxta Sanctorum Canonum Regulas Caroloman in Syn. Leptin Anno 747. and even referring themselves thither for the more clear understanding of what their Law only briefly and in General delivered ‖ P. 91. A Truth so Notorious that Dr. Wake himself durst not dissemble it And it would puzzle a man therefore to shew how such Laws should any ways derogate from the Authority of Synods which they took their rise from and were made on purpose to support and confirm I must put the Doctor in mind here of a way of arguing made use of by one of his Seconds in this Controversie where he is disputing against the Universities Authority to declare Heresie there he lays down this Position That the Convocation of the University of Oxford have never forbid any Doctrine to their Scholars before that very particular Doctrine was first declared Erroneous or Heretical by some Persons who were then reputed to have Power to declare Heresie * L. M. P. p. 69. The Truth of this Assertion I at present trouble not my self with but supposing it true the Inference that arises from it has weight I own and when applied to our Present Argument is of use to inform us what Secular Decrees in Church-matters are no ways prejudicial to the Power of the Church and the Authority of Synods And this was an Head I say upon which Dr. Wake should have explained himself largely and openly if he had intended a fair state of this Controversie or had had any other New in what he wrote than merely to serve a Turn and to advance some colourable kind of Plea for a Practice which if he knew any thing of these matters he must know was indefensible and be writing all the while for his Point against his Conscience and if he knew nothing of it with what Conscience could he undertake to determine it These are words that I do not easily persuade my self to bestow on any Man but his Gross Prevarications and Disguises of Truth in Doctrines of so great moment wherein the Interests of his Order and of Religion are so nearly concerned force this hard Language from me Nor stops he at General Reflections in this case but brings them home also to our own Church and Constitution pretending in his Appendix †Num. vii to give us an Abstract of several things relating to the Church which have been done since the 25 Hen. 8. by Private Commissions or otherwise out of Convocation In which Abstract many of the Points mentioned had certainly the Authority of Convocation tho' he would fain have us believe they had not and that antecedently to the Civil Injunction Others are such Acts of Ordinary Power as by the consent of All Churches and Parties of Men every Christian Prince is confessedly intitled to and some few perhaps might be owing to the Necessity of Affairs which would not then admit of more Regular Methods and should not therefore be vouched as reasonable Precedents and setled Rules and Standards of acting in more quiet times which is manifestly Dr. Wake 's End in producing them The Reader must forgive me if I detain him so long as to run through the Particulars of this List and shew upon each of 'em how far the Ecclesiastical Power concurred and led the way to it It will be a dry unpleasing Task but is of use to clear the Orderliness of some steps taken in those times which are generally misunderstood and is necessary to wipe off the Dirt thrown by Dr. Wake on the English Reformation the Process of which I am satisfied was very Regular and Canonical in most Cases tho' in some by reason of the Loss of Records it cannot easily be proved so Of this we are in General assured by such as lived at the time when those Records were in being particularly by Sir Robert Cotton and Mr. Fuller The first in his Posthuma * P. 215. has these words If any shall object that many Laws in Henry the Eighth's time had first the Ground in Parliament it is manifested by the Dates of their Acts in Convocation that they All had in that place their first Original The Latter speaks as follows Upon serious Examination it will appear that there was nothing done in the Reformation of Religion save what was acted by the Clergy in their Convocations or Grounded on some Act of theirs precedent to it with the Advice Counsel and Consent of the Bishops and most Eminent Church-men confirmed upon the Post-fact and not otherwise according to the Usage of the best and purest Times of Christianity * Church-Hist xvi Cent. p. 188. To which I shall add the Testimony of one who must be allowed a Good Witness in this case my Lord of Sarum He assures the Bishop of Meaux in the Answer he made to his Variations that Our Parliaments and Princes have not medled in matters of Religion any other way but that they have given the Civil Sanction to the Propositions made by the Church and this is that which Christian Princes do in all Places †P. 35. And in 1604 I find a Puritan Writer making this Challenge Let them if they can shew any one Instance of any Change or Alteration either from Religion to Superstition or from Superstition to Religion to have been made in Parliament unless the same freely and at large have been first agred upon in their Synods and Convocations ‖ Assertion of True and Christian Policy P. 168. Which is no otherwise considerable I own than as it comes from the Pen of an Adversary These are General Proofs which would go a good way towards setting aside the Particulars in
others and there was no change made in a Tittle by Parliament So that they only Enacted by a Law what the Convocation had done * Pp. 74 75. And agen As it were a Great Scandal on the first General Councils to say that they had no Authority for what they did but what they derived from the Civil Power so is it no less unjust to say because the Parliaments impowered †Here I must beg leave to say that his Lordship's Expression is not Exact The Parliament did not impower but approve of them some Persons to draw Forms for the more pure Administration of the Sacraments and Enacted that these only should be lawfully used in this Realm which is the Civil Sanction that therefore these Persons had no other Authority for what they did Was it ever heard of that the Civil Sanction which only makes any Constitution to have the force of a Law gives it another Authority than a Civil one The Prelates and other Divines that compiled our Forms of Ordination did it by vertue of the Authority they had from Christ as Pastors of his Church which did impower them to teach the People the pure Word of God and to administer the Sacraments and perform all other Holy Functions according to the Scripture the Practice of the Primitive Church and the Rules of Expediency and Reason and this they ought to have done tho' the Civil Power had opposed it in which case their Duty had been to have submitted to whatever Severities and Persecutions they might have been put to for the Name of Christ or the Truth of his Gospel But on the other hand when it pleased God to turn the Hearts of those which had the Chief Power to set forward this good Work then they did as they ought with all thankfulness acknowledge so great a Blessing and accept and improve the Authority of the Civil Power for adding the Sanction of a Law to the Reformation in all the Parts and Branches of it So by the Authority they derived from Christ and the Warrant they had from Scripture and the Primitive Church these Prelates and Divines made those Alterations and Changes in the Ordinal and the King and the Parliament who are vested with the Supreme Legislative Power added their Authority to them to make them obligatory on the Subjects * Pp. 53 54. I have produced these Passages at length not so much for any Light they give to the Particular we are now concerned in the Authority of the English Ordinal as for the General Use they may be of in setling the Dispute between Dr. W. and the Church about the Distinction of the Two Powers Ecclesiastical and Civil and the Obligations we are under to the Decisions of the one antecedently to the Sanctions of the other I subscribe to his Lordship's state of it and think nothing can be said more justly and truly 1552. The Observation of Holy-Days ordered by Act of Parliament Ibid. pag. 191. This Act traced the Steps of the Rubrick in the Common-Prayer-Book relating to Holy-Days and ordered none to be kept Holy but what had before-hand been so ordered to be kept by the Clergy in Convocations only it added New Penalties 1553. A New Catechism by the King's Order required to be taught by Schoolmasters Ibid. p. 219. This Catechism was published with the Articles of 1552. and had I suppose the very same Convocational Authority which those had It was compiled indeed by Poynet but is said in the King's Patent annexed to have been afterwards perused and allowed by the Bishops and other Learned Men by which we are to understand either the Convocation it self or a Grand Committee appointed by it and upon which its Power was devolved That the whole Convocation have been by these or such like Terms about this time often expressed the Instances given in the Margent * The Six Articles in the Act 31 H. 8. c. 14. are said to be agreed to by the Archbishops Bishops and other Learned Men of the Clergy who a little before are styl'd a Synod or Convocation In the Articles of 1536. See 'em in Bishop Burn. Vol. 1. Coll. of Rec. p. 305. the Convocation is expressed by the Bishops and others the most Discreet and Learned Men of the Clergy The Articles of 1552. are in the Title said to be such de quibus in Synodo Londinensi inter Episcopos alios Eruditos viros convenerat And iâ— will scarce I think bear a Reasonable Doubt whether these Articles passed the Convocation Finally The Act about Holidays as 't is called is in the Canon it self See it in Sparrow p. 167. said to be decreed by the King with the Common Assent and Consent of the Clergy in Convocation assembled But in the King's Letter to Bonner about it the words are By the Assents and Consents of all you Bishops and others Notable Personages of the Clergy of this our Realm in full Convocation and Assembly had for that purpose will evince And that this Catechism was generally understood to have the Authority of Convocation is plain even from the Exception made to it by Dr. Weston †For that said he there is a Book of late set forth called the Catechism bearing the Name of this Honourable Synod and yet put forth without your Consents as I have learned c. â—ox Vol. 2. p. 19. in the first Synod of Queen Mary but plainer still from Philpot's Reply to that Exception which discovers also to us somewhat of the Manner by which the Convocation came to be Intitled not to this Catechism alone but to several other Pieces that seem to carry the Name of a Committee only upon them His words are that This House of Convocation had granted the Authority to make Ecclesiastical Laws unto certain Persons to be appointed by the King's Majesty and whatsoever Ecclesiastical Laws They or the most part of them did set forth according to a Statute in that behalf provided it might be well said to be done in the Synod of London although such as be of this House now had no notice thereof before the Promulgation And in this Point be thought the setter forth thereof nothing to have slandered the House since they had our Synodal Authority unto them committed to make such Spiritual Laws as They thought convenient and necessary * â—bid p. â—0 The Knowledge of the Time and Circumstances of appointing this Committee we have lost together with the Acts themselves however plain it is from this Assertion of Mr. Philpot made in open Convocation that such a Committee there was named by the Crown at the Instance of the whole Clergy and that this Catechism among other things passed them and had on that account as He judged the Authority of Convocation It is left to the Reader by whom in this caâ—e he will be guided the Churches Martyr or her Betrayer And here the Instance of the Catechismus ad Parochos is very pat
Wake it seems has different notions of these things for he tells us that Whatever Priviledges he has shewn to belong to the Christian Magistrate they belong to him as such they are not derived from any Positive Laws and Constitutions but result from that Power which every such Prince has Originally in himself and are to be looked upon as part of those Rights which naturally belong to Sovereign Authority and that to prove any particular Prince entitled to these Rights it is sufficient to shew that he is a Sovereign Prince and therefore ought not to be denied any of those Prerogatives that belong to such a Prince unless it can be plainly made out that he has afterwards by his own Act Limited himself * Pp. 94 95. So that according to Dr. Wake 's Politicks All Kings in All Countries have an Equal Share of Power in their first Institution none of 'em being Originally Limited or subjected to any Restraints in the Arbitrary Exercise of their Authority but such as they have been pleased by after-acts and condescensions graciously to lay upon themselves Which Position how it can be reconciled with an Original Contract and with several Branches of the Late Declaration of Rights I do not see and how far it may appear to the Three States of this Realm to entrench on their share in the Government and on the Fundamental Rights and Liberties of the Free People of England Time must shew That all Bishops indeed are Equal is the known Maxim of St. Cyprian but which of the Fathers have said that All Kings are so too I am I confess as yet to learn For my part I should think it as easie a Task to prove that every Prince had originally the same Extent of Territory as that he had the same Degree of Power The Scales of Miles in several Countries are not more different than the Measures of Power and Priviledge that belong to the Prince and to the Subject But Dr. W. has breathed French Air for some time of his Life where such Arbitrary Schemes are in request and it appears that his Travels have not been lost upon him He has put 'em to that Use which a Modern Author * Moldsworth's Pref. to the State of Denmark observes to be too often made of 'em that they teach Men fit Methods of pleasing their Sovereigns at the Peoples Expence tho' at present I trust his Doctrine is a little out of season when we live under a Prince who will not be pleased with any thing that is Injurious to the Rights of the Least of his Subjects when duly informed of them Whereas then Dr. W. in great Friendship to the Liberties of his Church and of his Country asserts that by our Constitution the King of England has all that Power at this day over our Convocation that EVER ANY Christian Prince had over his Synod I would ask him one plain Question Whether the King and the Three States of the Realm together have not more Power in Church-matters and over Church-Synods than the King alone If so then cannot the King alone have All that Power which ever any Christian Prince had because some Christian Princes have had all the Power that was possible even as much as belongs to the King and the Three Estates in Conjunction There is one thing indeed which seems material to be observed and owned in this case 't is the Assertion of the Second Canon which declares our Kings to have the same Authority in Causes Ecclesiastical that the Christian Emperours in the Primitive Church had But this Canon must necessarily be understood of the King in Parliament for out of Parliament it is manifest that he is not so Absolute in Ecclesiastical Matters as those Emperors were In Parliament he can do every thing that is by the Law of God or of Reason lawful to be done out of Parliament he can do nothing but what the Particular Rules of our Constitution allow of And VIII This too is a Distinction which Dr. W. should have taken notice of had he intended to do Justice to his Argument For the Church here in England is under the Government both of the Absolute and Limited Sovereign under the Government of the Limited Sovereign within the Compass of his Prerogative under the Government of the Absolute Sovereign without any Restraints or Bounds except what the Revealed Will of God and the Eternal Rules of Right Reason prescribe The Pope usurped not only on the King the Limited but on the King and Parliament the Absolute Sovereign and what was taken from Him therefore was not all thrown into the Prerogative but restored severally to its respective Owners And of this Absolute Sovereign it is the Duty when Christian to act in a Christian manner to be directed in matters Spiritual by the Advice of Spiritual Persons and not lightly to vary from it By the same Rule the Limited Sovereign is to steer likewise within the Sphere of his Prerogative And he is also further obliged to preserve those Priviledges of the Church which belong to her by the Laws of the Realm Now Dr. Wake I say confounds these two Powers and the Subjections that are due to them speaking all along of the King as if He in Exclusion to the Three Estates had the Plenitude of Ecclesiastical Authority lodged in him and were the single Point in which the Obedience of the Church and of every Member of it centered This is a Fundamental Mistake that runs quite through his Book and is such an One as overturns our Constitution and confounds the Executive and Legislative parts of it and deserves a Reprehension therefore some other way than from the Pen of an Adversary Henry the Eighth 't is true in vertue of his Supreme Headship laid claim to a Vast and Boundless Power in Church-affairs had his Vicegerent in Convocation Enacted every thing there by his own Sole Authority issuing out his Injunctions as Laws at pleasure And these Powers whether of Right belonging to him or not were then submitted to by All who either wished ill to the Pope or well to the Reformation or wanted Courage otherwise to bear up against his Tyrannical Temper and Designs and were the more easily allowed of by Church-men because they saw him at the same time exercise as Extravagant an Authority in State-matters by the Consent of his Parliament However the Title of Supreme Head together with those Powers that were understood to belong to it was taken away in the â—â—â—st of Queen Mary and never afterwards reâ—ved but instead of it all Spiritual Iurisdictiâ—â— was declared to be annexed to the Imperial â—rown of this Realm 1 Eliz. c. 1. and the Queen enabled to â—xercise it by a Commissioner or Commissiâ—ners This Power continues no doubt in â—he Imperial Crown but can be exerted no â—therwise than in Parliament now since the â—igh Commission Court was taken away by â—he 17 Car. 1. It was attempted indeed to be
the End of Lynwood From what Copy it was taken is not said But those Copies which Sir Will. Dugdale Transcrib'd into the Second Volume of our English Councils See p. 320. differ'd from it it is clear if at least Sir William 's Transcripts are Exact and to be depended on Whether Archbishop Peckam found that the King had resolv'd to bring these Proctors to Parliament by his Own Authority and therefore prevented him by this Constitution or whether he did it to have their Counsel and Assistance in opposing the Statute of Mortmain which he foresaw would be attempted in that Parliament and was accordingly carried or upon what other View he acted I pretend not to say But from thence forward I take it for granted that such Proctors were constantly return'd to all the Clergy's Parliamentary Meetings and that purely upon an Ecclesiastical Call at first tho' the King soon let himself into a share in Convening them For in his Ninth year His and the Archbishop's Authority were joyntly and interchangeably employ'd in it the Archbishop signifying the King's Pleasure in his Letters Mandatory to the Clergy and the King on the other side Executing the Archbishop's Mandate by his Own Ministers The Case if my Collections deceive me not was thus The Bishops and their Clergy were Summon'd to a Synod at London by an Injunction from the Archbishop in which they were commanded also to meet at another Time and Place appointed by the King and that they might be sure so to do Letters of Citation are directed not to the Bishop of London but to the King himself to be by him communicated to the several Bishops by Royal Messengers This odd President we have an account of in the Register of Pâ—ckam * The Citatory Letters are dated Kal. Apr. 1281 And the same Formality I suppose was used in Convening the Clergy of York Province who met about this time at York as appears from a Writ extant in Pryn †Eccl. Jurisd T. 3. P. 275. impowring the Bishop of Carlisle to collect the Tenth of his own Diocese granted at that Provincial Assembly Next year the Prerogative got ground a little for the King holding his Parliament at Northampton commanded the Archbishop by Writ to Summon his Clergy thither to meet Coram Nobis vel coram fidelibus nostris quos ad hoc duximus deputandos See App. Num. VII ad audiendum faciendum ea quae pro Republicâ Vobis eis super his ostendi faciemus c. But the Persons which the Archbishop is directed to Summon are only Bishops Abbats Priors and other Heads of Religious Houses together with the Proxies of Deans and Chapters without any mention of Archdeacons or of the Diocesan Clergy who it may be were by a Particular Writ to be apply'd to afterwards and requir'd to follow the Pattern which the Superior Clergy should set according to the way sometimes practis'd in former Reigns ‖ See an Instance A. D. 1207 80. Joh. in Pryn 's Parl. Writ Vol. 1. Pref. So that this Meeting was just such another as that in the third of his Reign where the Majores Cleri only were present And yet at the Synod call'd on the same occasion by the A.B. of York in His Province we find the Diocesan Clergy appear'd and which is very remarkable the Laity of York-Province under Barons Milites Liberi Homines Communitates omnes alii de singulis Comitatibus ultrà Trentam had also their Summons to the same Time and Place with the Clergy So I gather from the Writ sent joyntly to both which being of a curious and uncommon Form will deserve a place in the Appendix * Numb VIII where the Reader will find also another directed to the Clergy and Laity of the Bishoprick of Durham who tho' meeting with the rest of York Province yet had it seems distinct Messages and Messengers sent to them and made likewise their separate Returns See Regist. Joh. Romani ad Ann. 1286. fol. 99. Regist. Grenefield ad Ann. 1310. f. 180. and something of this Priviledge I think that See even yet retains Hitherto then the Clergy were so far from meeting Nationally with the Parliament that the Lower part of the Parliament seems to have divided sometimes to accommodate it self to the Provincial Meetings of the Clergy How the King was obey'd in this Instance as to the Province of Canterbury appears from Peckam's Register where we find his Mandate †See App. Num. IX to the Bishop of London reciting the King 's Writ and commanding all the Bishops of his Province and all the others mention'd in it to assemble dictis die loco ob Reverentiam Regiae Majestatis de expedientibus reipublicae tractaturi but with words also that intimated his sense of the Hardship which this New Precedent laid 'em under and which the Clergy I suppose so understood as if he would not be very severe upon them tho' they should not comply with it Accordingly their Meeting at Northampton was but thin and they brake up immediately referring themselves to a Fuller Convocation to be call'd in the usual Form by the Archbishop and refusing to answer the King's Demands till such an one were Summon'd as it was soon afterwards ‖ See App. Num. IX and that being a Regular Assembly both as to the Place * Nov. Templ Lond. at which and the Authority †The Archbishop's by which they met and the Persons ‖ Totus Clerus are said to be call'd i. e. beside those Summon'd to Northampton the Archdeacons also and Diocesan-Clergy composing it the King's Business did there receive an Easie Dispatch Had the King 's Writ which call'd the Clergy before his Commissioners at Northampton been obey'd readily the way had been open'd towards his bringing the whole Body of 'em afterwards to Parliament But having fail'd in this and such like attempts and finding that the Archbishop and his Clergy understood one another and were secretly agreed to defeat him he afterwards went more roundly to work and without asking help from the Church was resolv'd to use only his Own Authority and accordingly Summon'd all the Great Abbats and Priors to Parliament Personally as well those who did not hold of him by Barony as those who did and the Lower Clergy by a Premunitory Clause inserted in the Writ to every Bishop At what time precisely this Method was first set on foot I cannot be positive but sure I am that a year before the 23 Edw. 1. the common Aera of the Praemunientes it was practis'd Peckam was now dead and Winchelsey not yet return'd with his Pall from Rome and the See of York fill'd with an Obnoxious Person * Ioh. Romanus Fin'd lately Four thousand Marks by Parliament †Ryley's Placita p. 141. and on that and some other accounts ‖ See Ibid. p. 173. now at the King's Mercy This lucky Juncture the King seems to have
Paradox however there is more to be said for it than at first sight may be imagin'd For as Minister and Thane were words Equivalent so it is certain that the latter of these was apply'd frequently to Spiritual Persons sometimes to Bishops †Adeò ut multi de Nobilissimis Thanis mortem obirent Eorum unus fuit Swithulfus Episcopus de Hrofceaster Chron. Sax. p. 97. but more often to Presbyters who in Athelstan's Laws are term'd * Apud Jorval pp. 845.846 Messe-Thegnes or Thanes Spiritual in opposition to Woruld Thegnes or Thanes Temporal and were at other times call'd Ministri Dei ‖ Ibid. p. 841. and Theo-Thayni if the Manuscript Note of a learned Person does not deceive me In a certain Charter I find one Ethelwald thus signing Wintoniensis Ecclesiae Minister Glastoniae Monachus †Monast. vol. 1 p. 17. in another Ego Ingvaldus Presbyter humilis Minister vocatus audivi * Ingulph p. 4. Sir H. Spelman further says that the Religiosi are sometimes in old Books call'd Ministeriales (⸪) Glossar in voc Minister and that in Domesday the Terra Tainorum Ecclesiae is often expresly mention'd * Reliq Spelman n. p. 42. Dr. Brady adds that under the Title of Terra Tainorum Regis the Lands of Priests and other Inferior Clergymen are often included * Introd App. p. 21. However this I propose as a Conjecture only to be admitted or refus'd as the Men of more skill in these Matters shall agree upon it That which I insist on is that the Attestations and Style of these Charters make it manifest that many of the Lower Clergy had place in those great Councils which confirm'd them How and in what Capacity they were summon'd thither whether as representing any part of the Spiritualty or as the King 's immediate Servants and Dependants his Hand-Preosts and Hir'd-Cleres as the Capellani and Presbyteri Regis are in the Saxon Chronicle odly call'd is another Enquiry which it is not very easy nor very necessary at present to determin Nor matters it much whether the Charters I have vouch'd be all Genuine or not for supposing them forg'd they must be allow'd at least to be well counterfited or else they would not have pass'd upon knowing Men when first produc'd The Monks who Coyn'd them were no Bunglers but understood very well the state of those Times to which they adjusted these Instruments and drew them no doubt according to authentick Forms and Patterns And a Testimony therefore taken from thence concerning the Customs and Usages of those times holds near as well as if they were confessedly Genuine and of the very Age they pretend At the bottom of these Instruments * See Evidentiae Cant. col 2212. and of some Ecclesiastical Synods †See Spelm. Conc. V. 1. pp. 328. 325. among the other Inferior Clerks Archdeacons now and then appear and those not Titular ones only but such as had Authority and held their Courts for Matters Spiritual even in the Saxon times whatever a late Writer ⸪ Nicolson Hist. Lib. Vol. 3. p. 207. pretends to the contrary who both as an Antiquary and an Archdeacon should have understood this point better The Words of the Conquerors Writ whereby he separated the two Jurisdictions are a plain Proof of this for they run Nullus Episcopus vel Archidiaconus de Legibus Episcopalibus ampliùs in Hundret Placita teneat c. which implys the Archdeacons to have exercis'd Jurisdiction in the Hundred Courts before the Conqueror came in especially if we add the Praefatory Words of that Writ where he styles these Usages such as had obtaind in regno Anglorum usque ad mea tempora But because this matter is with so much assurance deny'd by that Writer and is generally so much mistaken it may not be amiss to add a few Instances more some of which carry the Proof of it above an hundred Years higher than the Aera pretended Sir H. Spelman's Opinion in this Case is of Great Weight and may go for a General Proof His Words are The Archdeacon in the Saxon times had a superintendent Power over all Parochial Parsons in every Deanery of his Precinct * Rel. Spelm. p. 50 The Acts of the Synod of Worster Printed by Mr. Wharton †A. S. vol. 1. p. 543. recite a Constitution of St. Dunstan and Archbishop Oswald made about the middle of the X th Century which ordains qùod nullus Decanus nullus Archidiaconus de Monachorum Ecclesiis vel Clericis se intromittat nisi per Priorem Ecclesiae Wigorn And there is an Elder Charter of this Dunstan while Bishop of London still preserv'd * In Cartulario Westm. Faustina A. 3. f. 13 whereby he grants a burying place to the Church of Westminster so that whosoever petierit se ibi sepeliri non impediatur vel ab Episcopo vel ab Archidiacono vel à Parochiano suo Presbytero The Northumbrian Canons allso fram'd not much after set this point beyond dispute Two of these are 6. Si Presbyter Edictum Archidiaconi non exequatur XII Oris eluito 7. Si Presbyter reus criminis contra Archidiaconi Prohibitionem Missam celebraverit XII Oris dependito †Spelm. Conc. V. 1. p. 496. And methinks this Last Instance at least might have been known to a man who professes to have made the Antiquitys of our Northern Countys his Peculiar Study and has ventur'd to add his insipid Remarks to those of the Learned Cambden particularly in that of Northumberland 'T is true the Great Man he mentions places the Rise of the Archdeacons Jurisdiction no higher than He does but That was in favour to his Own Order in which cases the Best and Greatest Men are not allways so Discerning or so Indifferent as they ought to be It was a slip of that truly Great Man's Memory who had not then the words of the Conquerors Writ in his View which prove the contrary whereas our Archdeacon sleepily produces those very words †P. 207. but a Page or two before he espouses this Opinion Nor can he pretend that he is speaking only of the Archdeacon's Jurisdiction when it became Independent of the Bishops whereas till the Conquest he acted merely as a Deputy for besides that this is more than He knows his Words are plain that the Archdeacons had no Iurisdiction in the Saxon times their whole Business being to attend the Bishops at Ordinations and other Publick Services in the Cathedral * P. 209. And the same is said but in more forcible Terms by the Great Man whose Opinion he implicitly transcribes and approves But we are not to wonder that He who so Liberally gives up the General Rights of his Church should be as ready to quit any Particular Point that is to the Advantage of his Own Office and Authority He makes amends however a little afterwards * P. 210. and learnedly proves that
would have been tempted to think that he spake upon good Grounds and had well consider'd what he said Whereas in truth he was merely upon the Conjecture and having found that the Convocations of 1640. and 1603. acted by Commission concluded presently that all the Precedent ones must have done so too forgetting in the mean time that wise Maxim of his Own with which he very fitly introduces as wise a Chapter So great says he is that Uncertainty to which all Human Constitutions are expos'd that tho' I have before sufficiently shewn what the Nature of our Convocation at present is and what Authority our King 's have over it yet we can by no means from thence conclude that this was always the case †P. 147. Which deep Remark had it been in his View throughout his Book would have instructed him not to determin so peremptorily upon the Course of Antient Practise from some Modern Instances it would have sav'd him the shame of slipping into so many false and groundless Assertions on this Head and me the trouble of exposing them When he resolv'd for Reasons best known to himself to set up for a Champion in this Cause he should either have taken care fully to instruct himself in the matters he wrote of or at least where he was conscious of his want of Light he should have had the Discretion to express himself a little more warily The oldest Aera therefore of these Commissions which impower the Convocation to Treat c. is 1. I. 1. how that New Precedent came then to be set and what Restraints it may be conceiv'd to have laid on the Clergys Liberty of Debate I shall now briefly enquire It must be confess'd that K. Iames who had been somewhat less than a King in Scotland took upon him to be somewhat more than a King assoon as he came to the Crown of England spoke of his Prerogative in a very high tone look'd upon it as some Innate Power divinely annex'd to the Kingly Character and did not stick to call it so frequently in his Speeches and Messages †See his Speech to the Bishops and Ministers Spotswood p. 534. Letter to the Assembly of Perth ib. p. 537. and sometimes to talk even of a Sovereign and Absolute Authority which he enjoy'd as freely as any King or Monarch in the World †See his Declaration in 1605. Spotswood p. 488. Bishop Bancroft who had corresponded with him formerly in Scotland knew his Temper well and the Church having then Great Business to do and He himself some for the See of Cant. was then void contriv'd we may imagin how to humor it in the approaching Convocation wherein He was to Preside and to that end procur'd this Ample Commission as an Instance of the great Deference and Submission which the Church of England paid to the Royal Authority Indeed the Clergy had reason to shew all the Marks of Duty and Respect that were fiting to a Prince that had shewn himself so fast a friend to them as K. Iames in the Hampton-Court Conference which immediately preceded this Convocation had done Where he had declar'd openly for All the Rites and Ceremonies of the Church against the Scruples of those who were then called Puritans and had peremptorily commanded them to Conform This I say may be suppos'd to have wrought on the Clergys Gratitude and made them easier to accept such a Commission now than they would have been in any other Juncture especially since by it though they might seem to abridge their Liberty in One Respect yet they certainly enlarg'd it another For whereas in Former Convocations which were not thus Commission'd the Custom had been to draw up their Rules and Canons in an Unauthoritative Style and without denouncing Spiritual Penaltys on the Infringers of them according to the Pattern set by the Old Canons here the Clergy first began solemnly to Decree and Ordain and to annex the Sentence of Excommunication to the Breach of those Ordinances The Canons of Q. Elizabeth's time where they run most in the Style of Authority do yet rise no higher than to a Cautum est nequis †See Sparrow p. 245. as before in 1584. p. 193. Volumus etiam †Ibid p. 252. and Decernendum censemus * Ibid. p. 247. but in 1603 the very first Canon begins with Statuimus Ordinamus ‖ And so in those of 1640. We Ordain and Decree Can. 1. The Synod doth ordain and decree Can. 2. and the Sanction of several of them runs thus Excommunicetur ipso facto non nisi per Achiepiscopum restituendus idque postquam resipuerit ac impium hunc errorem publice revocarit The Previous License therefore qualifying them to Decree in form and to bring their Canons up to the antient Synodical Pattern they might for this reason be enclin'd to make use of it imagining how justly has since appear'd the Ground they got in one respect to be an Equivalent for what they lost in another Something too of this Caution might be owing to the Circumstances and Temper of the Times when there was no good understanding between Them and the Great Men of the Law the Two Jurisdictions clashing mightily and when those who underhand blew the Coals between Them and the Nonconformists were uneasy under the Clergys late Victory at Hampton-Court and would not have been sorry to see them make an ill use of it or to have had any Handle towards disputing the Legality of their after proceedings On this account a License under the Broad-Seal might be thought convenient to cover them not so much from the Law it self as from Popular Complaint and Misconstruction And if these Reasons may be suppos'd to be then of weight for the beginning this Practise they were yet stronger afterwards for the continuance of it in 1640. when the Passions and Prejudices of Men ran even higher against them than Now and every thing they did was more likely to be misinterpreted Thus far by way of Enquiry into the particular Grounds and Motives from whence this New Precedent may be suppos'd to have sprung let us now see how far the Clergys Liberty of Debate was really affected by it and we shall find this not to have been to such a Degree as is commonly imagin'd For in relation to this License there are Three things that deserve to be consider'd 1. That it was not granted the Clergy immediately upon their first coming together The Convocation had sat from March 20. to April 12. that is three full Weeks without a Commission and to be sure therefore had in that time Treated without one and did not therefore think themselves unqualify'd for all manner of Synodical Debates till they were so commission'd 2. It is very observable that in the King's Letters Patents of Confirmation †See them in the English Edition of the Canons in 1603. reciting this License there is a plain difference
hujusmodi negotia retardari suis ad Nos directis Apicibus rogavâ—t ut Clerum totius nostrae Cant. Prov. in formâ praescriptâ convocari faceremus ad diem locum antedictos ad tractand super ipsis consentiend hiis quae tunc salubriter ordinari contigerit in eodem Nos igitur tanto promptiùs tantóque favorabilius Votis Regiis Inclinantes qùo Negotium de quo agitur Ecclesiam Anglic. Regnum Regni Incolas tam personas Ecclesiasticas quam Laïcas omnes proculdubio contingit proüt haec apud omnes fore credidimus notoriè divulgata quóque ad id faciend ' ex necessitate curae nobis incumbentis novimus nos teneri cum quibusdam Fratribus Coëpiscopis nostris habito super hoc Tractatu pleniori Regio Rogatui more consueto duximus ut debuimus annuendum Quo circà Tenore praesentium peremptoriè Vos citamus qùod Vos Domine Prior Personaliter Capitulum per Unum sufficientem Procuratorem compareatis in dicto Parliamento apud Westmr. proüt hactenùs fieri consuevit â die S ti Joh. Baptistae prox fut in 3 Septimanas cum continuatione prorogatione dierum subsequentium ad tractand unà Nobiscum super praemissis aliis urgentibus Ecclae Anglic. atque Regni in hâc parte Negotiis in Domini nostri Regis Parliamento ibid. celebrando nec non consentiend ' hiis omnibus quae ad honorem Dei Ecclae suae sanctae Utilitatem totius reïpublicae ac regni supradicti divinâ disponente Clementià ibidem contigerit salubriter ordinari Dat. 8. Kal. Iun. 1321. Reg. Henr. Prior. fol. 224. XV. Petitio Cleri Cant. Provinciae See p. 358. This Petition from the Matter of it seems to have been made A o. 1529. See Bishop Burnet V. 1 p. 82. UT Ecclesia Anglicana gaudeat fruatur omnibus singulis Iuribus Libertatibus Consuetudinibus antiquis Privilegiis ac Immunitatibus concessis a Nobilis Memoriae Regiae Sublimitatis Progenitoribus Regibus Angliae proüt in Cartis Concessionibus eorundem praesertim in Cartâ magnâ in Cartâ de Forestâ in Cartâ Edwardi super Articulis Cleri atque in brevi Circumspectè agatis nec non Edwardi quarti aliis item Immunitatibus suis quibuscunque Et quia Clerus summopere affectat vitare offensam Regiae sublimitatis aequum non est ut aliquis paenam Violatae Legis incurrat quam scire non potuit ut dignetur sua sublimitas curare ac jubere ut certi ac praescripti Limites clarè designentur Casuum statutorum de Premunire sicque extra illos casus declaratos aliqua non incurratur paena ne de caetero decernatur à Curâ—â Regiâ emittendum contra ullum Iudicem Ecclesiasticum aut partes Litigantes Breve praefatum de Praemunire nisi praemissiâ prohibitione regiâ in Casibus praescriptis Praeterea cum Clerus multum Gravaminis ac Damni sustineat ratione statutorum in praesenti Parliamento editorum Libertatem Ecclesiasticam sanctiones Canonicas enervantium in animarum statuentium quorumcúnque Executioni demandantium periculum manifestum sententiamque excommunicationis notoriè damnabiliter incurrendo ad quae facienda nec consenserunt per se nec per Procuratores suos neque super eïsdem consulti fuerunt Ipsaque eadem statuta paenas tum graves tùm inevitabiles in se contineant non nihil etiam Iniquitatis habeant contra Charitatem Canonicas sanctiones edita sintque in se adeo captiosa ut difficile sit ea non violare Hospitalitati quoque non parùm derogantia miseris Vicariis Rectoriarum suarum Conductionem ut videtur prohibentia ut iidem Patres quorum est Veritatem Canonum annuntiare remedium opportunum in statutis praedictis provideant tam praesenti quam futuris temporibus debitè consulentes Postremò cum sine fide impossibile est placere deo ut dignetur Regia sublimitas in fidei favorem aliquod statutum in praesenti Parliamento edere contra Haereticos fautorésque Haereticorum Defensores Receptatores eorundem nec non contra Libros suspectos aut prohibitos tenentes habentes in regnum asportantes per Ordinarios locorum non approbatos vendentes unà cum bonorum quorumcunque de Haeresi primà vice per Ordinarios condemnatorum indicatorum confiscatione Domino nostro Regi caeteris Clausulis opportunis Bibl. Cotton Cleopatra F. 2. XVI See p. 375. PHilip and Mary by the Grace of God King and Queen of England Fraunce Naples Ierusalem and Ireland Defenders of the Faith Prince of Spain and Sicil Archeduk of Austrie Duke of Burgundy Myllaine and Brabant Countyes of Haspurg Flaunders and Tyroll To all Men to whom these Presents shall come Greeting Where we have grauntid to the most Reverend Father in God and our most Trustye and Derest Cosin Reynald Cardinal Pole Legate de Latere to the Pope's Holiness sent to Us and to our Realms and Dominions our Letters Patents of our Will and Consent for the free using of his Facultyes Auctoritys and Iurisdiction Legantine in fourme heare under following that is to say Philip and Mary by the Grace of God c. Greeting Whereas it hath pleased our most Holy Father the Pope Iuly the 3 d. to send unto Us and this our Realme of England and the Dominions of the same the most Reverend Father in God and our most trusty and derest Cosin Reynold Cardinal Pole his Legate de Latere with certain Auctorities of Iurisdiction Grace Faculties and Dispensations to be ministred exercised and graunted by auctoritie of our said Holy Father and See Apostolike to the Subjects of our said Realme and Dominions of the same as they shall for their Relief sue and make request to our said Cosin executing his said Commission and Legacy aforesaid We calling to our Remembrance and Understanding the Godly Purpose and Intente of our said most Derest Cosin his most honourable Legacion and that the same is most beneficial and to the spiritual Solace and Consolation of Us and our said Subjects whose good Order and right walking in the Laws of God and our Mother Holy Church we much desier and therefore we are most glad of the Accesse and Repaier of our said most dear Cosyn unto us and this our Realme with the said Auctoritie of Jurisdiction from our said Holy Father the Pope's Holiness and See Apostolike And for the further Declaration thereof we do by these our Letters Patents declare our Pleasures and good Contentments to be that our said Cosyn shall repaier unto us and into our said Realme and the Dominions thereof with his said Auctoritie of Jurisdictions and to use and exercise his Auctoritie Legantine by himself or by his Officers and Ministers under him of whatsoever Nation Country State or Condition soever they be Denyzons or not Denyzons and that his said Repaier with the said Auctorities is not only unto Us most