Reformers with one odious Name or other and above all are so very desirous to have it believed that the pretended Church of Rome but real Synagogue of Satan is a true Church of Christ which they are no more able to make out than to prove the Devil to be a true Angel of Light. For instead of being a Catholick Church it is a plain Catholick Apostacy as the Protestation of Archbishop Vsher and the rest of the Irish Bishops Novemb. 1626. does justly term it AN ANSWER TO THE BOOK HAving now done with the Preface before I return an Answer to any part of the Book I shall set down the Substance of it whereby the Reader will be enabled to judg what parts of it do require an Answer The Design of my Book was to shew that the Primitive Christians would have been for a Bill of Exclusion which I proved by shewing how much they were against a Pagan Successor both by their hearty Wishes he had been fore-closed and by their Uneasiness under him when he was Emperor Our Author answers the former of these Proofs by endeavouring to shew that the Empire was not Hereditary which I have already considered in the Preface And as for the other Proof which was the Behaviour of the Christians toward Julian when he was Emperor it is all Matter of Fact and therefore tho our Author wrangles and raises many Cavils about it some of which I shall examine anon yet he cannot disprove one Syllable of it Now this Argument concludes à fortiori thus Would not the Christians have petitioned at least for Julian's Exclusion when he was a Subject seeing they spent so many Prayers and Tears for his Destruction when he was Emperor Would that whole Church which leaped for Joy and triumphed at his untimely and violent Death have scrupled his Exclusion Would they have thought Julian wronged in being barred from succeeding to the Empire who thought themselves wronged and injured in that Constantius did not kill him instead of making him Caesar Which Julian himself represents as the Sence of the City of Antioch The Behaviour of the Christians was so very rough towards Julian that I could not ascribe it wholly to his being a Pagan but shewed that his Illegal Oppression and Tyranny was also the cause why they pursued him with so much Hatred The Substance of our Author's Answer to this is That Julian could not oppress them illegally if he would because it was his Royal Pleasure to have the Christians suffer after this manner and his Will according to Gregory was an unwritten Law and much stronger than the written ones which were not back'd with Power and Authority Yes that is Gregory's Complaint and the very illegal Oppression against which he exclaims That when the Christians were under the Protection of the Publick Laws and Edicts yet they were destroyed by dumb Signs and private Hints and oftentimes upon a meer presumption of the Emperor's Pleasure And whoever will please to read Jacob. Gothofredus his Vlpianus sive de Principe legibus soluto will see how much our Author has perverted and misapplied all the Shreds of Civil Law which he hath made use of upon this occasion In short our Author grants that the Christians were highly provoked against Julian but then he says p. 182. The main Ground of their Displeasure against him was this That he would not formally persecute them nor put them to Death enough As for the word Formally we find that explained p. 133. He put them not to Death formally as Christians but accused and condemned them for other Crimes Now this is one Instance which I gave of his illegal Oppression and Tyranny that being it did not stand with his Conveniences to enact Sanguinary Laws against Christianity he found out ways of putting the Christians to Death upon false and pretended Crimes of Sacrilege and Treason So that tho they died meerly for their Religion yet they had not the Honour of dying for it but suffered under the Character of the greatest Malefactors and both they and their Reputation were murdered at once This indeed was a just Cause of their Displeasure against Julian but I cannot say with our Author that they were displeased at him because he did not put them to Death enough for I thought he had given them their Belly-full of that Does Gregory call him Dragon Murtherer common Cut-Throat or as the Scholiast renders it bloody Devil for this because he did not put them to Death enough Were there no Halters nor Precipices in the Roman Empire but must Heaven and Earth be moved against Julian for this because he would not put them to Death enough I can only say 'T is very much This Discourse about Julian's illegal Oppression of the Christians and their Behaviour thereupon towards him led me to speak of the Duty of Passive Obedience or suffering for our Religion which I asserted to be our Duty only then when the Laws are against our Religion and shewed that Christianity does not oblige us to submit to illegal Violence but to defend our selves against it I found a Necessity for the true stating of this Duty because the Doctrine of Passive Obedience has been so handled of late as to tempt Oppression and Tyranny into the World by pressing it upon Mens Consciences as a necessary Duty that they ought to submit to the most Arbitrary Oppression and illegal destructive Violence I shewed that by this Doctrine in the Case of a Popish Successor which is no impossible Case witness the Expedient at Oxford we should be ready bound hand and foot to invite the Popish Knife it would expose a whole Protestant People and Nation at once and give them but one Neck which a Popish Successor by the Principles of his Religion is bound to cut off In defence of this Doctrine our Author spends the Remainder of his Book to which as being a matter of the greatest Consequence I shall immediately apply my self and consider the Arguments which he has brought for it That I may avoid all Obscurity in an Argument of this weight and importance wherein the Lives of all English Protestants and their Posterity are concerned I shall 1. Shew how far this Author and I are perfectly agreed 2. State the Difference betwixt us We are both agreed 1. That the King's Person is Sacred and inviolable by Law. 2. That inferior Magistrates acting by the King's Authority according to Law may not be resisted And therefore neither the King's Person nor his Authority are any ways included in this Controversy But in the second place it is somewhat more difficult to state the Difference betwixt us for never was there such a Proteus of Passive Doctrine as this is Nevertheless by tracing him carefully quite through this Argument I find his Sence to be this That by the Imperial Laws or Laws of the Prerogative in case the Forces of a Popish and Tyrannical Prince do outrage and murther the
very agreeable to his Hypothesis for then the Regal or Imperial Power had been discharged of the Politick Clog and had governed all alone and the Notions of Sovereignty and Passive Obedience had been as clear as the Sun. But then in some other unlucky places the same Fortescue speaking of the self-same Thing says That those former Kings of England would have parted with their Law Politick and Regal too and would fain have changed them both for the Civil Law. It seems they were as weary of the one as of the other which could not possibly be help'd because they were all one And now I appeal to all the World whether here be any Foundation for a Table of Imperial Laws which can at pleasure destroy the Lives Liberties and Properties of the Subject And whether on the other side according to Fortescue the Safety and Security of the People be not the supream Law of a Regal and Politick Kingdom But because our Author is mighty troublesom with his Imperial Laws and Imperial Power and boundless Power and such like Terms of his own coining which is a Presumption at least that what he writes is not Law but his own Dreams which no Terms of English Law can express I shall tell him from these Passages of Fortescue That the greatest Power the King of England has is this that he can do no Wrong that he cannot authorize any Man or Number of Men to destroy his Subjects contrary to Law consequently that all such illegal destructive Acts tho attempted in his Name are inauthoritative and do neither bind any Man's Conscience nor tie any Man's Hands from using those Remedies which the Laws of God and Nature as well as the Common and Statute-Laws of the Land do allow to be used against all evil-disposed Persons I shall tell him likewise from these following Authorities and many more which might be produced that his Assertion of an absolute unbounded Power in the King which is limited only in the Exercise of it is perniciously false For the Law gives the King his Power and Dominion says Bracton We hold only what the Law holds saith Judg Jenkins The King's Prerogative and the Subjects Liberty are determined and bounded and admeasured by a written Law what they are We do not hold the King to have any more Power neither doth his Majesty claim any other but what the Law gives him Accordingly King Charles the First acknowledges that his Prerogatives are built upon the Law of the Land which in another place he declares are the justest Rule and Measure for them I shall add but one remarkable Passage more out of the King's Answer to both Houses concerning the Militia Feb. 28. 1641. And his Majesty is willing to grant every of them such Commissions as he hath done this Parliament to some Lords Lieutenants by your Advice but if that Power be not thought enough but that more shall be thought fit to be granted to these Persons named than by the Law is in the Crown it self his Majesty holds it reasonable that the same be by some Law first vested in him with Power to transfer it to these Persons which He will willingly do Now this is Demonstration if the Law be the Measure of the King's Power then he has no Power beyond the Bounds of the Law and whatsoever is pretended in the King's Name beyond those Bounds is void and carries no manner of Authority with it Whereas to say the King's Power is absolute and boundless is to say the Government is absolute and arbitrary and requires absolute and unlimited Subjection For it is Nonsence to say that boundless Power can be limited in the Exercise of it for boundless Power which has in it the whole Legislative Power can at pleasure make a Law to take away that Limitation and he that is limited only by his own pleasure is not limited at all And again that is not Power which cannot be exercised and therefore a Fountain full of boundless Power which cannot be brought into Act is a Fountain full of inauthoritative Authority or full of Emptifulness So much for our Author's Fountain Pipes and Channels We have his other Illustration of a boundless limited Power in these Words To be confined in the Exercise doth not destroy the Being nor diminish the Perfection of Sovereign Power for then the Power of God himself could not be Sovereign because there are certain immutable Rules of Truth and Justice within which it is necessarily limited and confined I answer As God exercises no Power which is inconsistent with Truth and Justice so he has no such Power in him in the Root or Being for it is all Imperfection and Weakness And that he neither exercises nor has any such Power is not to be imputed to any intrinsecal Limitation or Confinement but to the infinite and illimited Perfection of his Nature And if such a miscalled Power or Possibility of doing wickedly be found in the Creature it is because he is a Creature it proceeds from Finiteness and Defect And to shew our Author how much more Light there is in a few plain Words than in his Similitudes and Illustrations I say It is self-evident that a Man has no more Power in any kind than he can exercise A Man has no more natural Power than he can naturally exercise he has no more moral Power than he can morally exercise he has no more Civil or Legal Power than he can legally exercise For to say he has more Power than he can exercise is to say he can do more than he can do And therefore an Ocean of our Author 's boundless lawful Power of doing what cannot lawfully be done will not fill an Egg-shell and is such a New-nothing as even Children will despise Before I pass from this Distinction of Imperial and Political Laws I must say somewhat to a Heap of Authorities which we have p. 208 209. to prove that the Realm of England is an Empire that the Crown of it is an Imperial Crown and that one of the Saxon Kings stiled himself Basileus Imperator Dominus Well what of all that The Realm of England is an Empire has an Imperial Crown and is as independent upon any Foreign Realm as the Empire of Turkie therefore the Freemen of England are as very Slaves as any are in Turky and under Imperial or Bowstring Law. If that be your Consequence I will give you your whole Life's time to make it good But Edgar stiled himself Basileus Imperator Dominus And Carolus Rex signifies a great deal more than all those three Titles did I am ashamed to see Rolls of Parliament quoted for such poor Trifles for it is plain by all the Remains which we have of the Saxon Times by History by the Saxon Laws by King Alfred's Will in Asser Menevensis and by the Mirrour that the Saxon Kings were far from being absolute Emperors having no other Power than what
Christians and to avoid Impediments It seems he was afraid even then that the Christians would put a Spoke in his Cart and was so apprehensive of meeting with some dangerous Rubs from them that he slavishly dissembled his Religion The next thing in the Preface worth observing is our Author 's taking offence at my general way of speaking concerning the Behavior of the Christians under Julian that I say they and their when only particular Persons are mentioned I answer Where I have made a general Inference from the Behaviour of particular Persons either those Persons were Fathers themselves who by common Construction are Representatives and deliver to us the Sence of the Church or else the Thing which is done by them is commended and applauded by the Fathers which is the same thing as if they had done it themselves But a great part of the Instances which I give are the general and publick Acts of great Numbers in the Church a Congregation a City or the like not to mention what was done by the whole Church And therefore these Instances ought not to be levell'd with those which our Author produces in Queen Mary's Days of Things which were done but not owned and which as we use to say No-Body did For our Author might have had the Reward of Twenty Marks and Thanks if he could have inform'd who it was that hang'd up the Cat. And as for Wyat's Rebellion it was upon account of the Spanish Match and Religion was only pretended as our Author 's own Quotation from Mr. Bradford does acknowledg I shall overlook the rest till I come to his Discourse about the Bill of Exclusion where in the first place we meet with a subtil Defence for the Addressers For it was not the Popish Successor as Popish but the Succession which they promised to maintain I like the Distinction very well only our Author applies it by the halves for I wonder he does not say that they made this Promise too not as Protestants but as Addressers But it seems the Suffolk-Protestants did thus maintain the Succession of Queen Mary They did so but the Case was very different for then there was no possibility of a Bill of Exclusion Q. Mary by virtue of an Act of Parliament was actually Queen and yet they gave her no assistance but upon her Promise to maintain the established Protestant Religion Which Promise was so well and truly performed that we may well be excused from trusting any Popish Prince as those poor Men did who afterwards had the Opportunity of seeing their Error from the Vantage-Ground of a Pillory and by the Fire-Light in Smithfield As for Archbishop Cranmer's disclaiming and recanting his being concern'd in setting up King Edward's Will against an Act of Parliament it manifestly makes for me and shews what authority Cranmer ascribed to an Act of Parliament which gave Queen Mary all her Title after he himself had been the greatest Instrument of rendring her Illegitimate by causing her Mother's Marriage to be declared null and void from the beginning Tho I might well have taken no notice of it because our Author is pleased to do the same by Bishop Ridley's Sermon at Paul's-Cross where he put by the appointed Preacher only to have an Opportunity of telling the People what Reason they had to put by Queen Mary Would that brave Martyr have been against a Bill of Exclusion who was so zealous for Exclusion without a Bill Presently after we have Objections thick and threefold against the Bishops Reasons in Q Elizabeth's time recorded by Sir Sim. D'Ewes He will not allow the Bishops by any means to be the Authors of them that so he may take the greater Liberty in vilifying and speaking his pleasure of them Just as p. 236. he dissembles his Knowledg of a Book to be my Lord Hollis's which to my knowledg he knew to be his as well as I only that he might the more safely persist in calling it Impious and Treasonable And because he appeals to me whether I think the Bishops of the Church of England could pen such a Popish or Presbyterian Piece I answer 1. That I do verily believe they did pen that Piece and further that there were few others in those Days who were able to pen so learned a Piece And 2. I will join issue with him when he pleases that it is neither a Popish nor Presbyterian Piece but worthy of the zealous Prelates of that Age and agreeable to the Doctrine of the Homilies to which all the Clergy of England have subscribed which is more than can be said of Dr. Hickes's Peculium Dei. First There is no ground in the World to suspect but these Arguments were part of the Reasons presented to the Queen in Parliament because the Title says they were and it is manifest that they are all in the same strain and of a piece and further Sir Simonds says that then which was above fifty Years ago there were written Copies of them remaining in many hands at which time it was very easy if they had been forged to have discovered it 2dly This Paper of Reasons ought not to be called Anonymous for in the Body of it the Bishops are named as the Authors of it whereby the certain Authors of a Book are better known than by a Title or Inscription 3dly There is nothing in those Reasons but what was fit for Bishops in Parliament to urge I say in Parliament where there was full Authority to have enacted all their Conclusions but had been very improper to urge to a Judg at an Assizes which very different Cases I am afraid the Peculium doth not distinguish In short those Reasons are foully misrepresented by this Author and rendred as only fit to proceed from a Scotizing Presbyterian Suppose now I should do the same by Jovian and with more Justice say it was a Book written by the Priests in Newgate as not believing that a Book which manifestly carries on Coleman's Design and is made up of the very Doctrine of his Declaration for dissolving the Parliament could come from a Minister of London This would not be well taken therefore our Author must pardon me if it raises my Indignation to have a Bench of as Reverend Bishops as ever were in the World treated in the same manner And I do again renew my Promise that if he will please to print the Reasons of that Parliament at large as I desired the Reader to peruse them at large and add a Confutation of the Bishops Arguments it shall not want an Answer Is it a Popish Piece because it was for having a Law to put an Idolater to Death Why then our Homilies are Popish too for commending the Christian Iconoclast Emperors who punished Image-worshippers and Image-maintainers with Death Or a Presbyterian Piece Truly that is very notably guessed What because it talks of Godly Bishops where it says We see not how we can be accounted Godly Bishops or faithful Subjects if in
common Peril we should not cry and give warning A Scotizing Presbyterian would as soon have talkt of black Swans Well but according to our Author from excluding the next Heir to the Crown out of the World there is no Consequence at all to excluding him from the Crown I thought there had but this it is not to be skilled in Jewish Learning For he says a rebellious First-born amongst the Jews might be put to Death but not disinherited This is the prettiest Argument in the Book if it were true but it is like the rest and notoriously false For his own Selden whom he quotes for such a Saying as Pax est bona in the 24 th Chap. of the very same Book shews him several ways how the First-born or only Son or any Son might be disinherited and defeated of his Succession I see every Body has not a Petavius to direct him However a Man that could but read the English Translation of the Bible might know that a Jewish Father had power to disinherit because Deut. 21.15 that Power is restrained in one particular Case Grotius upon the place gives the reason of that Restraint says he The Father might for just cause transfer the Right of the First-born to a younger Brother but the Law took away that Liberty from a Man who had two Wives together where there was danger it might be done upon light and trifling Occasions And truly the Case of an Hebrew Heir had been very hard if it had been Neck or nothing if he might by the Law have been put to Death for that for which he might not be disinherited Tho by the way the Rabbins say That Law of putting a Son to Death was never practised no more than that of Retaliation an Eye for an Eye and a Tooth for a Tooth He falsely and invidiously says I challenge the House of Lords the three Estates of Scotland c. to give but one Reason to prove a Bill of Exclusion to be unlawful I did not look so high nor think of those great Persons but of those whom I have often conversed with and who according to the Character I there gave of them have furiously reproached three successive Houses of Commons upon account of that Bill And I am afraid I shall have occasion to call upon them for their Reasons even after this Author's performance I always meant those Men who have misled too many and too great Persons into a Belief that a Bill of Exclusion is against both Law and Conscience that it is such Injustice as ought not to be done to save the World from perishing And after they have asserted this and laid it down for Gospel are not able to say one wise Word in defence of it and till they do I am sure all the World will give me leave to follow them with this reasonable Demand I. His first Argument is That an Act of Exclusion is void because it tends to the Disherison of the Crown This is so far from being true that an Act of Parliament which should deny the King and Parliament a Power of governing the Succession would be a proper Act of Disherison of the Crown because it would destroy one of the greatest Prerogatives of the Crown and devest the King of such a Power as is part of his Crown and which alone in many Cases can secure the whole to him According to what Serjeant Manwood affirm'd in Parliament 13 Eliz. That as for the Authority of Parliament in determining of the Crown it could not in reasonable Construction be otherwise for whosoever should deny that Authority did deny the Queen to be Queen and the Realm to be a Realm The truth of it is it tears up the very Foundations of our Government For as Bishop Bilson has exprest it The Foundation of all the Laws of our Country is this That what the Prince and most Part of her Barons and Burgesses shall confirm that shall stand for Good. But to come to the Point this unalterable Norman Entail whence is it It was certainly made with hands tho all the Roman Emperors had not the Art of making one Now I assert That the King in his Parliament when ever he pleases to call one has all the Power upon Earth and full as much as ever was upon English Ground and consequently can govern this Norman Entail as shall be most for the Preservation of his Majesty's Sacred Person from Popish Plots and of this Protestant Realm from the Hellish Power of Rome And to deny this were to disherit and disable the Crown and as Mr. Mounson in the 13 th of Eliz. expresses it were an horrible Saying As an Appendix to this first Argument first he asks a shrewd Question If the Acts of Hen. VIII about Succession were valid by what Authority was the House of Suffolk excluded and King James admitted to the Crown contrary to many Statutes against him If our Author will shew me but one of those many Statutes whereby King James stood excluded I will yield him the Cause In the mean time I wonder a Man should offer to make Acts of Parliament no more than waste Paper when he knows nothing of them and to talk of the House of Suffolk's Exclusion when it was never included nor ever had any Title or Pretensions to the Crown and above all to be so very absurd as to quote the Recognition of the High-Court of Parliament 1 Jac. cap. 1. where King James's Succession is owned for lawful when at the same time he is invalidating all Acts of Parliament which limit and determine of the Succession For as the same Mr. Mounson argues It were horrible to say that the Parliament hath not Authority to determine of the Crown for then would ensue not only the annihilating of the Statute 35 Hen. 8. but that the Statute made in the first Year of her Majesty's Reign of Recognition should be laid void a Matter containing a greater Consequent than is convenient to be uttered So that if our Author disables Acts of Parliament which limit and bind the Descent of the Crown he likewise disables that Act of Recognition Our Author's Partner Mr. Long has urged this Act of Recognition 1 Jacobi more strongly than any one Argument in his Book besides for because it was made since the 13 th of Elizabeth he opposeth it to that and gives it all the Power of a last Will. To which I shall only say thus much That the very same Recognition to a tittle might have been made to King James tho Mary Queen of Scots had been still living and had only stood excluded by Act of Parliament For as Mr. Long may see by the Act before the Common-Prayer-Book 14 Carol. 2. the Law can make great Numbers of Men as if they were dead and naturally dead before their Time yea tho many of them had a Jus divinum to preach as being Episcopally ordained and were descended in a right Line from
the very Apostles 2dly Our Author quotes two Authorities The one says A Bill of Exclusion if it should pass would change the Essence of the Monarchy and make the Crown Elective or as another ingenious but I am sure very scurrilous and irreverent Pen saith it would tend to make a Football of the Crown and turn an Hereditary Kingdom into Elective The same Answer will serve them both namely That an Act of disinheriting from the Crown does own and proclaim and prove the Kingdom to be Hereditary And further I would be glad to know in what part of the Globe that Elective Kingdom lies where the very Essence of it is this that the present Possessor of the Crown shall have Power in declaring or disabling his Successor II. His next Argument is from the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy wherein a Minister of London especially ought to have used no Sophistry because Oaths are sacred Things and ought not by false Glosses and Interpretations to be turn'd into Snares to entangle the Consciences of those who hereafter shall be desirous to secure the Protestant Religion and withal to involve three successive Houses of Commons in the Guilt of Perjury only for discharging their Consciences to God and their Country And because our Author after he has done thus stands upon his Justification and calls his Way of Arguing plain and honest and says he is not conscious of the least Sophistry in it I shall endeavour to make his Sophistry stare him in the face I shewed him before in my Preface by the most convincing Proof that could be produced that by the Heirs and Successors mentioned in these Oaths are meant Kings and Queens of this Realm of England And if the old Oath of Allegiance at Common-Law which I there quoted had not expresly said so yet Common-Sense would have taught us the very same For Allegiance sworn to a Subject must needs be Treason And therefore as I there argued it is a Falshood of very dangerous Consequence to say that any Person besides his Majesty hath now any Interest in those Oaths or can lay claim to any part of them Our Author had done well to have answered that Argument before he had fallen to new-vamping of old baffled Fallacies which I shall now examine By the Oath of Supremacy as he says true we are sworn to our Power to assist and defend all Jurisdictions Privileges Preheminencies and Authorities granted or belonging to the Kings Highness his Heirs and lawful Successors united and annexed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm Now one of these Jurisdictions granted or belonging to the King's Highness his Heirs and lawful Successors united and annexed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm is this That the King with and by the Authority of the Parliament of England is able to make Laws and Statutes of sufficient force and validity to limit and bind the Crown of this Realm and the Descent Limitation Inheritance and Government thereof And therefore I ask if they be not the perjured Persons who by asserting an unalterable Succession endeavour to destroy this Jurisdiction Privilege and Authority which they are sworn to maintain But our Author 's honest way of arguing is to have four Terms in a Syllogism As thus We are sworn to defend the Rights of Supremacy vested in the King Ergo we are bound to defend an unalterable Succession which is contrary to the Rights of this Supremacy Again we are sworn to defend all Privileges belonging to the King's Heirs and Successors that is Kings and Queens of England Ergo we are sworn to defend all the Privileges belonging to such as are neither Kings nor Queens but Subjects of England and if they be excluded never can be Kings or Queens of England And therefore to our Author's first Question I answer No Subject can possibly have undoubted transcendent and essential Rights Privileges and Preheminencies united to the Imperial Crown of England for if so then the Imperial Crown of England is united to his Rights which I would desire our Author to take heed of affirming for we can have but one Soveraign as there is but one Sun in the Firmament To his second Question I answer By lawful Successors is meant Kings and Queens of England which have not been always next Heirs by Proximity of Blood witness Henry 7. Q. Mary and Q. Elizabeth who could not be both Heirs in that manner to Edward the 6 th And further I say that the Oath of Supremacy only binds us to the King in being and not to the whole Royal Family otherwise we should have a great many Soveraigns at once and it is made in our Author's Phrase for the Behoof and Interest of the Crown and not for the Behoof of him who may never be concern'd in it In the next place we have these Words Some indeed have said with our Author that the Oath of Supremacy is a Protestant Oath and so could not be understood in a Sence destructive to the Protestant Religion which is a meer Shift and proves nothing because it proves too much Sir I think it was much more a Shift to find out a way to drive on the Popes Interest by an Oath which does most solemnly renounce him and under a pretence of unalterable Succession of which there is not the least shadow in this Oath but the direct contrary to abandon this Protestant Kingdom to the Hellish Tyranny of Rome which we are sworn to oppose and all Protestants will oppose even under a Popish Successor if any such can be in England and let Dr. Watson prove it if he can to be no less than resisting the Ordinance of God. But methinks it had been time enough to offer to prove that after the Pope's Power had been re-established by a Law and not to go about it now when it is Treason to endeavour to reconcile Men to the Church of Rome Thus much the Oath of Supremacy proves which is not nothing nor a Jot too much And further it proves that we are bound in order to the keeping out the Pope's Power which we have utterly renounced humbly to beg of his Majesty to foreclose a Popish Successor who will infallibly let it in I am sure this way of assisting and defending the Jurisdictions and Authorities of the Crown is in our Power and so is within the compass of our Oath and therefore we are treacherous to the Crown and false to our Oath as well as to God and to our Religion if we will not do so much for any of them as this comes to And I do seriously and earnestly recommend this Consideration to all that have taken the Oath of Supremacy and especially to the Clergy of England who have taken it several times over As for our Author 's saying That moderate Papists will take the Oath of Supremacy I shall only say this to it Let him shew me a Man that has taken this Oath and prove him to be a Papist and I
you and your People no small Security and Comfort With such Laws as saith St. Thomas should all Mankind have been governed if in Paradise they had not transgressed God's Commandment With such Laws also was the Synagogue ruled while it was under God only as King who adopted the same to him for a peculiar Kingdom but at the last when at their request they had a Man-King set over them they were then under Royal Laws only brought very low Chap. 10. Then the Prince thus said How cometh it to pass good Chancellor that one King may govern his People by Power Royal only and that another King can have no such Power Seeing both these Kings are in Dignity equal I cannot chuse but much muse and marvel why in Power they should thus differ Of which Difference in Authority over their Subjects the Chancellor in the next Chapter promises to shew the Reason which is grounded upon the different Originals of those Kingdoms And accordingly chap. 12. he shews that an Absolute Monarchy is founded in the forced Consent of a subdued and inslaved People and chap. 13. That a Kingdom of Politick Governance is founded in the voluntary Consent of the Community And after he has illustrated the first Institution of a Politick Kingdom by shewing how it resembles the Formation of a natural Body he thus proceeds in the 13 th Chapter Now you understand most noble Prince the Form of Institution of a Kingdom Politick whereby you may measure the Power which the King thereof may exercise over the Law and Subjects of the same For such a King is made and ordained for the Defence of the Law of his Subjects and of their Bodies and Goods whereunto he receiveth Power of his People so that he cannot govern his People by any other Power Wherefore to satisfy your Request in that you desire to be certified how it cometh to pass that in the Power of Kings there is so great diversity Surely in mine Opinion the diversity of the Institutions or first Ordinances of those Dignities which I have now declared is the only Cause of this foresaid Difference as of the Premises by the Discourse of Reason you may easily gather For thus the Kingdom of England out of Brute's Retinue of the Trojans which he brought out of the Coasts of Italy and Greece first grew to a Politick and Regal Dominion Thus also Scotland which sometime was subject to England as a Dukedom thereof was advanced to a Politick and Royal Kingdom Many other Kingdoms also had thus their first beginning not only of Regal but also of Politick Government Wherefore Diodorus Siculus in his second Book of ancient History thus writeth of the Egyptians The Egyptian Kings lived at first not after the licentious manner of other Rulers whose Will and Pleasure is instead of Law but as it had been private Persons they were bound by the Law neither did they think much at it being persuaded that by obeying the Laws they should be happy For by such Rulers as followed their own Lusts they thought many Things were done whereby they should incur divers Harms and Perils And in his fourth Book thus he writeth The Ethiopian King as soon as he is created he ordereth his Life according to the Laws and doth all things after the Manner and Custom of his Country assigning neither Reward nor Punishment to any Man other than the Law made by his Predecessors appointeth He reporteth much the same of the King of Saba in Arabia Faelix and of certain other Kings which in old Time reigned happily Chap. 14. To whom the Prince thus answered You have good Chancellor with the clear Light of your Declaration dispelled the Clouds wherewith my Mind was darkned so that I do most evidently see that no Nation did ever of their own voluntary Mind incorporate themselves into a Kingdom for any other Intent but only to the end that they might enjoy their Lives and Fortunes which they were afraid of losing with greater Security than before And of this Intent should such a Nation be utterly defrauded if then their King might spoil them of their Goods which before was lawful for no Man to do And yet should such a People be much more injured if they should afterwards be governed by foreign and strange Laws yea and such as they peradventure deadly hated and abhorred And most of all if by those Laws their Substance should be diminished for the Safeguard whereof as also for the Security of their Persons they of their own accord submitted themselves to the Governance of a King. No such Power for certain could proceed from the People themselves and yet unless it had been from the People themselves such a King could have had no Power at all over them Now on the other side I perceive it to stand much otherwise with a Kingdom which is incorporate by the King 's sole Power and Authority because such a Nation is subject to him upon no other Terms but that this Nation which was made his Kingdom by his Will and Pleasure should obey and be governed by his Laws which are nothing else but the same Will and Pleasure Neither have I yet good Chancellor forgotten that which in your Treatise of the Nature of the Law of Nature you have learnedly proved that the Power of these two Kings is equal while the Power of the one whereby he is at liberty to deal wrongfully is not by such Liberty augmented as to have Power to decay and die is not Power but because of the Privations which are added to it is rather to be called Impotency and Want of Power because as Boetius saith Power is not but to Good. So that to be able to do Evil which the King who rules Regally is more at liberty to do than the King that has a Politick Dominion over his People is rather a Diminution than an Increase of his Power For the Holy Spirits which are now established in Glory and cannot sin do in Power far excell and pass us who have a delight and pleasure to run headlong into all kind of Wickedness It is plain to any attentive Reader that throughout this long Discourse Fortescue speaks but of two sorts of Kingdoms an absolute Monarchy and a limited Monarchy the latter of which he sometimes calls a Politick Government and sometimes he calls the very same Regal and Politick to distinguish it more expresly from an Aristocracy or Democracy But I will prove this beyond contradiction by some other Passages in Fortescue where he tells us that some of the former Kings of England would fain have changed the Laws of England for the Civil Law and did all they could to shake off this Politick Yoke of the Law of England that they also might rule or rather rage over their Subjects in Regal wise only and for this end endeavoured with might and main to cast away their Politick Government This is what our Author would have and
for going contrary to my Declaration and Acknowledgment ordered by the Act of Uniformity Wherein I have abhorred that Traitorous Position of taking Arms by the King's Authority against his Person or those that are commissionated by him Upon which he adds It was apparently the Design of the Three Estates in this Act to secure the Nation of such Ministers as would preach up the Doctrine of Non-resistance without distinction But if it were they are very much disappointed for our Author himself who is as good at Indistinction and Confusion in other Matters as any Man does not preach the Doctrine of Non-resistance without distinction but handles it with the Subtilty of a Schoolman For he grants p. 280 that one who is sent by the King's Order to assassinate or destroy his Subjects is not commissionated by the King for he may be resisted by the King's Law which is his most authoritative Command But great Numbers or Forces so employed may not be resisted So that his Doctrine is this That if twenty Men come one by one with the King's Order to do an illegal and destructive Act they are not commissionated and may be resisted but if the same Number come together Rank and File with the same Order and upon the same Errand then they are commissionated and may not be resisted Is this preaching up the Doctrine of Non-resistance without distinction Or rather is it not making a silly Distinction without a difference Again in the same place he has Distinction upon Distinction in these Words The Doctrine of Passive Obedience allows a Man to resist or use the Sword to defend his Life when the Laws from which I except all Laws destructive of the King's Crown and Regality authorize him so to do This is preaching up and preaching down the same Doctrine in the same Breath upon a wicked Supposition that the Laws of the Land which protect the Subject are destructive of the King's Crown and Regality Now on the other hand all faithful Ministers of the Church of England preach Obedience to the Laws and Non-resistance of those who are commissionated by the King without distinction and without deceiving the People to their Destruction and telling them those are commissionated by the King whom the Law declares are not commissionated nor can be commissionated as no Man can be to destroy lawful Subjects Such illegal Commissions are declared by Magna Charta to be null and void and so we ought to account them as you may see by the following Words And for this our Gift and Grant of these Liberties and of others contained in our Charter of Liberties of our Forrest the Archbishops Bishops Abbots Priors Earls Barons Knights Freeholders and other our Subjects have given unto us the fifteenth part of all their Moveables And we have granted to them on the other part that neither we nor our Heirs shall procure or do any thing whereby the Liberties in this Charter contained shall be infringed or broken And if any thing be procured by any Person contrary to the Premises it shall be had of no force or effect So that what St. Paul says of an Idol may be fitly applied to a Commission contrary to Law For we know that an illegal Commission is nothing in the World. And accordingly we find in Acts of Grace that Men who act upon such Commissions do stand in as much need of Pardon as other Men and had the Benefit of the Act of Oblivion in the first place as you may see by the Particulars which are there pardoned First all and all manner of Treasons Misprisions of Treason Murthers Felonies Offences Crimes Contempts and Misdemeanours counselled commanded acted or done since the first of January in the Year of our Lord 1637 by any Person or Persons before the 24 th of June 1660 other than the Persons hereafter by Name excepted in such manner as they are hereafter excepted by virtue or colour of any Command Power Authority Commission or Warrant or Instructions from his late Majesty King Charles or his Majesty that now is or from any other Person or Persons deriving or pretending to derive Authority mediately or immediately of or from both Houses or either House of Parliament or of or from any Convention or Assembly called or reputed or taking on the Name of a Parliament c. be pardoned released indempnified discharged and put in utter Oblivion His fourth and last Principle upon which he builds his false Passive Obedience is a false Pretence of the Sovereign's Honour concerning which he says p. 279. The Laws are more tender of our Sovereign's Honour as he is God's Minister than of his Subjects Lives As if the King's Honour and his good Subjects Lives could ever stand in such a dangerous Competition that one of them must of necessity destroy the other and as if the Laws of England had provided that the Lives of the People of England should be sacrificed to the King's Honour Has our Author been abroad to fetch home pour ma Gloire and to render it into this English He might have had sounder and safer Notions at home out of Judg Jenkins whom he often quotes to no purpose Pag. 134. we have these Words The Gentleman says We do not swear meaning in the Oath of Supremacy that the King is above all Law nor above the Safety of his People Neither do we so swear says Judg Jenkins but his Majesty and we will swear to the contrary and have sworn and have made good and will by God's Grace make good our Oath to the World that the KING is not above the Law nor above the Safety of his People The Law and the Safety of the People are his Safety his Honour and his Strength And accordingly it has been always declared in Parliament to be the Honour and Glory of the Kings of England that they were Kings of Freemen and not of Slaves whereby they have been enabled to do greater Things and to make a larger Figure in the World than Princes of five times their Territories But this Author has pick'd up quite contrary Notions and thinks it a Dishonour to the King if the generous People which he governs be not Slaves to every Parcel of Criminals who against the King's Crown and Dignity shall wickedly destroy them in his Name I have now done with every Thing that looks like an Argument in this Discourse of Passive Obedience for as for the following Chapter there is nothing new in it he only chews the Cud upon his Notions of Sovereignty and rings Changes upon his Imperial and Political Laws And then in the 12 th Chapter after he has bound us hand and foot and prepared us for the Popish Knife he has the Face to tell us That notwithstanding this Doctrine of Non-resistance or Passive Obedience we shall be secure enough of our Lives Properties and Religion under a Popish Successor For after he has given us the Security of God's Care