affirm That neither the King of England nor the Church of England neither Convocation nor Parliament did breake his two Necessary Bonds of Christian Vnity or either of them or any part of either of them But that the Very Breakers and Violaters of these Rules were the Pope and Court of Rome They did breake his Rule of Faith by adding new points to the Necessary Doctrin of saving Truth which were not the Legaceyes of Christ and his Apostles nor delivered unto us by Universall and perpetuall Tradition The Pope and Court of Rome did breake his second Rule of Vnity in Discipline by obtruding their excessive and intolerable usurpations vpon the Christian world and particularly upon the Church of England as necessary Conditions of their Communion It appeareth plainly by comparing that which hath been said with his positioÌ„ of the case that after all his Bragges of undeniable evidence and unquestionable certeinty he hath quite missed the question We joine with him in his rule of Faith Wee oppose not St. Peters Primacy of Order and he him self dare not say that St. Peter had a larger or more extended power then the rest of his Fellow Apostles And though wee cannot force our understandings to assent that after the death of S. Peter Linus or Cletus or Clemens or Anacleâ—us were Superiours to S. Iohn and had actuall Iurisdiction over him who had as large a commission immediatly from Christ as S. Peter himselfe and larger then any succeeding Romane Bishop ever had Yet to shew him how little wee are concerned in it and for his clearer conviction wee are willing to suppose that they were his Superiours and give him leave to make all the advantage of his second Rule which he can in this cause And here if I regarded not the satisfaction of my self and the Reader more then his opposition I might withdraw my hand from the Table But I am so great a Friend of Ingenuity that I will for once discharge his Office and shew the World demonstratively and distinctly what Branches of Papall power were cast out of England by Henry the eighth upon which consideration the weight of the whole Controversy doth lye For it is agreed between us that if it appeare by rigorous Evidence that all those Branches of Papall power which were renounced and cast out of England by Henry the eight were grosse Vsurpattons then his renouncing was no eriminall Breach but a lawfull self enfranchisement And by undeniable consequence the Guilt of â—chism resteth upon them who made the Vsurpations that is the Pope and Court of Rome I adde further upon the equity of my second Ground that although Henry the eight had cast out something more then be ought yet if wee hold not out more then wee ought and be ready to admitt all which ought to be admitted by us then we are innocent and free from the Guilt of Schism and it resteth soly upon them who either will have more then their due or nothing Wheresoever the fault is there the Guilt of Schisme is If the fault be single the Guilt is single if the fault be mutuall the Guilt is mutuall And for rigorous Evidence There cannot possibly be any Evidence more demonstrative what Papall power was cast out of England then the very Acts of Parliaments themselves by which it was cast out Let us view them all The first Act made in the Reign of Henry the eight which hath any referente to Rome is the Act for holding Plurality of Benefices against the lawes of the land by dispensation from the Court of Rome making licenses for non Residence from the Court of Rome to be voide and the party who procureth such Licenses for Pluralityes or Non-residence to forfeyt twenty pounds and to lose the profits of that Benefice which he holdeth by such dispensation It were a pretty thing indeed if the Church and Kingdome should make necessary lawes and the Pope might give them liberty to break them at his pleasure The second Act is that No person shall be cited out of tâ—e diocesse where he dwelleth except in certain cases Which though it may seem to reflect upon the Court of Rome yet I do not find that it is concerned in it but the Arches Audience and other Archiepiscopall Courts within the Realm The third Act is meerly declarative of the law of the land as well the Common lawes as the Statute lawes and grounded wholy upon them as by the View of the Statute it self doth appeare So it casteth out no forraine power but what the lawes had cast out before The summe of it is this That all Causes Matrimoniall Testamentary or about Tithes c. shall be heard and finally judged in England by the proper Iudges Ecclesiasticall and Civill respectively and not elswhere notwithstanding any forrein Inhibitions Appeales Sentences citations suppensions or Excommunications And that if any English Subject procure a Processe Inhibition Appeale c. From or to the Court of Rome or execute them to the hinderance of any processe here he shall incurre the Penalties ordained by the Statute of provision or premunire made in the sixteenth yeare of King Richard the second against such as make provision to the See of Rome This law was eâ—larged afterwards to all causes of Ecclesiasticall cognisance and all appeales to Rome forbidden The fourth Act is an Act for punishing of Heresy Wherein there are three clauses that concern the Bishop of Rome The First is this And that there be many Heresies and paines and punishments for Heresies Declared and ordained in and by the Canonicall Sanctions and by the Lawes and Ordinations made by the Popes or Bishops of Rome and by their Authorities for holding doing preaching of things contrary to the said Canonicall Sanctions Lawes and Ordinances which be but humane being meer repugnant and contrarious to the royall Prerogative Regall Iurisdiction Lawes Statutes and Ordinances of this Realm The second Clause is that No License be obtained of the Bishop of Rome to Preach in any part of this Realm or to doe any thing contrary to the Lawes and Statutes of this Realm or the Kings Prerogative Royall The third Clause followeth That the Decrees of the Bishops of Rome not confirmed by Holy Scriptures were never commonly attested to be any Law of God or man within this Realme And that it should not be deemed Heresy to speak or doe contrary to the pretended power or Authority of the Bishop of Rome made or given by Humane Lawes and not by Scriptures nor to speake or Act contrary to the Lawes of the Bishop of Rome being contrary to the Lawes of this Realm The Fifth Act is an Act concerning the Submission of the Clergy to the Kings Majesty The scope of it is this that the Clergy shall not assemble in Convocation nor make or proniulge any new Canons without the Kings License Hitherto there is nothing new in point of Law Then that the King should have
had no coactive power to compell any man against his Will The Vttermost they could doe was to separate him from their Communion and to leave him to the Comming or Iudgement of Christ. Let him be Anathema mar an atha The true Controversy then is this Whether the Bishop of Rome by his Legates have Coactive power in the exteriour Court to Convocate Synods of English Subjects in England when he will where he will whom he will without their Consents and without the leave of the Soveraign Prince or King of England The Case being thus stated determineth it self Where should the Pope appoint a place of meeting in England without the Leave of the King of England Wee see by often experience that if the Pope have a desire to summon a Councell in Italy within the Dominions of another Soveraign Prince or Republick although they be of his own Communion he must First aske leave and obtein leave before he can tell how to doe it Or how should he pretend to any Coactive power in England without the Kings grant or leave where the power of the Militia and all Coactive force is legally invested in the King Thus for point of right Now for matter of Fact First I doe utterly deny that any Bishop of Rome by his own Authority did Convocate any Synod in the Brittish Island during the First eleven hundred yeares Or preside in any by his Legates Or confirm them by his Authority If he be no table to produce so much as one instance to the Contrary he may cry guilty to the Vsurpation where of he is accused and hold his peace forever Secondly I doe confesse that after eleven hundred yeares The Bishops of Rome taking advantage of our civill combustions and prostituting the reputation of the Apostolicall See to their temporall ends did by the leave of our Kings not otherwise sometimes call Synods in England and preside in them The first Synod held in England by any of the Popes Legats was at London in the yeare 1125. by Ioannes Cremensis Which moved England into no smal indignation to see a thing till then unheard of in the Kingdome of England A Priest sitting president upon an high throne above Arch Bishops Bishops bats c. But remember my third ground or Consideration of the difference betwen affirmative and negative Presidents All which this proveth is that the King did give leave or connive at that time But it doth not prove it cannot prove a right to doe the same at other times when the King contradicteth it Further wee ought to take notice that there is a greate deale of difference between an Ordinary Synod and an English Convocation Although in truth our Convocations be Synods So called from one word in the Kings writ to Summon them Convocari facias All the Clergy of the Realm were not present at an ordinary Synod but all the whole Clergy of the Kingdome were present at a Convocation either in their Persons or by their Proctors sufficiently authorised Secondly the absent Clergy had no such Obligation to the Acts of a Papall Synod as they had to the Acts of a royall Convocation sub Hypotheca bonorum omnium under the Caution or Pledge of all their Goods and Estates Lastly to drive the naile home and to demonstrate clearly the Grossenesse of this Papall usurpation it remaineth onely to shew that by the Ancient Lawes of England the calling of Convocations or Synods belonged properly to the King not to the Bishop of Rome or his Legates And first by reason By the Lawes of England more ancient then the Popes intrusion no Roman Legat could enter into the Kingdome withont the Kings leave nor continue in it longer then he had his License as wee shall see hereafter and therefore they could not convocate any Synods nor doe any Synodicall Act without the Kings leave Secondly by Records of the English Convocation itself that the Convocations of the Clergy of the Realm of England are alwayes have been and ought to be Assembled by the Kings Writ Anno 1532. Thirdly by the Form of the Writt which hath ever been the same in all succeding Ages constantly directed from the King to the English Arch Bishops for their distinct Provinces The very Form speakes it English sufficiently For certain difficult and urgent Businesses concerning the defence and security of the English Church and the peace tranquility publik good and defence of our Kingdome and Subjects Wee command and require you by that Allegiance and Love which you owe â—o us that you cause to be convocated with convenient speed in due manner all and singular Bishops of your Province Deanes and Priors of Cathedrall Churches c. And the whole Clergy of your diocesse and Province to meet before you c. Another Writ did alwayes issue from the King for the dissolution Wee command you that you dissolve or cause to be dissolved this present Convocation this very day in due manner without any delay c. Lastly by the concurring Testimonyes of all our Historiographers That all the space of time of eleven hundred yeares wherein the Popes did neither call Councells nor Preside in them nor Confirm them and after unto the very Reformation Our Kings did both call Councells and Preside in them and Confirm them and own their Lawes as I have shewed him by the Lawes of Ercombert Ina Withred Alfred Edwerd Athelstan Edmund Edgar Athelred Canutus and Edward the Confessor in my Vindication And particularly that Theodore Arch-Bishop of Canterbury Presided in a Councell in the Presence of Iohn the Popes Legate That King Edward Assembled a Synod and Confirmed the Acts of it as Decreâ—um Regis The Kings decree That King Withred called a Councell at Becancelde and Presided in it and that the decrees of the Councell issued in his name and by his Authority Firmiter decernimus c. in my Answer to the Bishop of Chalcedon All this he pretendeth to have answered but it is with deep silence If he desire more Presidents and more witnesses he may have a cloud of Authors upon holding up his Finger to prove undeniably that King Henry did not innovate at all in challenging to himself the right to Convocate the Clergy and dissolve them and confirm their Acts with in his own Dominions but followed the steps of his Roâ—al Predecessors in all Ages from the first planting of religion untill his own dayes And not onely of his own Ancestors but his Neighbours The President of Charles the great is very conspicuous To omit all my former Allegations in this behalf In the French Synod I Charlemain Duke and Prince of the Frankes by the Advise of the Servants of God and my Princes have congregated the Bishops wich are in my Kingdome with the Priests to a Synod for the feare of Christ to Counsaile me how the Law of God and Ecclesiasticall Religion may be recovered which in the Dayes of forepassed Princes is dissipated and fallen
that the Canons of the Fathers be not sleighted But they who never exercised one Act of IurisdictioÌ„ in the Brittannick Iland for the first 600 years cannot pretend that it was under their power in the time of the Councell of Ephesus or long after It was not for nothing that he concealed the words of the Councell Yet he asketh what do the Scots concern the Church of Englands Vindication Do they not Are not the Scots a part of the Britannick Ilands and so comprehended under the name of the Church of England in this Question Besides he must know that I challenge some Interest among the Irish Scots from whom I derive my Episcopall Orders Against the Irish Ordination never any man had any pretense of Exception to this Day The Irish were the ancient and principall Scots and the Britannick Scots a Colony derived from them That they are the ancient Scots who did join with the Britons in not submitting to the See of Rome I shall shew him clearly from the Authority of Lawrence Successor to S. Austin in his Archbishoprick and the other English Bishops of that Age in their Letter to the Bishops of Scotland To conclude he tooke not onely Care of the new Church collected of the English but of the old Inhabitants of Britain and also of the Scots who inhabit Ireland the next Island to Britain For assoone as he knew that their life and profession in their Country was like that of the Brittons in Britany not Ecclesiasticall c. That is to say not Roman He seeth I had some reason not to â—eave out the Scots Besides the Britons the Scots and the Irish I urged that the great Kingdomes of Morcia and Northumberland were converted by the Scots and had their Religion and Ordination first from the Scots afterwards among themselves without any forrein dependence and so were as free as the Britons He saith all the force lieth in these words without any Forrein dependence wich I obtrude â—pon them without any proofe His mistakes are infinite my proofe is Demonstrative They who had their first Ordination from the Scots and ever after were Ordeined among themselves never had any Ordination from the Bishop of Rome and consequently were never subject to the Iurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome For it is a Maxime in the Law and is most evident in the case of the Cyprian Bishops in the Councell of Ephesus that the right of â—urisdiction doth follow the right of Ordination And if it were not so yet what man in his right wits could Imagin that the Scots who were the Converters should renounce Subjection to the Bishop of Rome themselves and teach their Converts the Mercians and Northumbrians to submit to the Bishop of Rome But if I had said no more but onely that they were without any forrein dependence it had been enough on my part It belongeth not to me to prove a Negative and such a continued Negative as this is but the burthen of the proofe resteth wholy upon him both in reason and Law to prove his Affirmative that the MerciaÌ„s and Northumbrians did depend upon the Bishop of Rome in those dayes in point of practise for Ordination and Iurisdiction which he is not able to doe What he addeth that I said Ordination is nothing at all to Iurisdiction is for want of Vnderstanding because he is not able to distinguish between the right of Ordination and the Act of Ordeining We attribute to the Scots the Act of Ordeining not a Superiour right of Ordination In the next place I urged that a world of British Christians staid behind among the Saxon Conquerours every where all over England such whom they had no cause to feare for their power Activity or Influence upon others which poore Conquered Christians had a right to the just Privileges of their Ancestours He would perswade us First that all of them or all except some few fled into Wales or Cornwall What to do To be repacked there as herrings Or like Camelions to live upon the aire and leave all the rest of the Kingdome desolate It was not ten or twenty nor a hundred nor aâ— thousand little Vessells could bring over Saxons enough with their wifes and Children and Servants to plant the Kingdomes of England We see dayly that the very Armies of such Conquerours doe consist for the greater part of Natives and that it is not their forrain Numbers but their Military Skill and resolution which gaineth them the Victory Looke upon all the Kingdomes of the world Italy Spain France England c. and what are they but mixed Societies of Forreiners and Natives Conquerers and Conquered persons now iâ—corporated with little or no distinction by long Tract of time After the Norman Conquest hundreds of English inhabited England for one Norman In the beginning of the late Insurrection in Ireland notwithstaÌ„ding those great nâ—mbers which came over daily into Ireland and Scotland to seeke for Plantations for thirty or forty yeares together yet there were ten Irish for one English and Scotch and yet we do not find that these Saxon warres were so bloudy as the Irish warres or that either they persecuted the persons of the Britons with Cruelty or so much as demolished their Churches But he supposeth that if there were any such British Christians yet they became subject to the Pope I believe some of them were subject to the Pope as to the Bishop of their Mother Church and all of them as to the Bishop of an Apostolicall Church that is to be guided by his grave advise and direction but I deny that ever the Saxon Bishops were subject to the Pope as to an absolute Monarch by Christs own ordination or that the Pope enjoyed the Soveraign Patronage of the Saxon Church or the Supreme Legislative Iudiciary or dispensative power over it This the Saxon Kings and their Bishops under theÌ„ ever enjoyed as the Britons did before them and this is all which our Kings desire or we claime for them If he have any thing to say to this point let him bring Authorities not words He saith This is all one as if some few men setling by accident in France should pretend an exemption from the French Lawes and expect English Privileges Nay it is cleare contrary as if some French men comming into Britaine and planting and propagating there should expect the British Privileges to their Posterity So the Saxons planting in Britain so soone as their Posterity was capable of them by becomming Christians might justly claime the Liberties and Privileges of British Christians I said the Saxon Conquest gave them as good title to the Privileges as to the Lands of the Britons He stileth it a rare reason as if I meant that Ecclesiasticall Iurisdiction were a thing of that nature to be won by the sword Or rather as if he meant Coactive Iurisdiction in the Exteriour Court and Iurisdiction purely Spirituall which Christ left unto his Church is all one I
were ordeined at home and therefore the Bishop of Rome could have no jurisdiction over them I said no more of Phocas but this that the Popes preteÌ„ses were more from Phocas then St. Peter He referreth me to his answer to Doctor Hammond And I refer him to Doctor Hammond for a reply as Impertinent to my present businesse When I did first apply my thoughts to a sad Meditation upon this Subject I confesse ingenuously that which gave me the most trouble was to satisfy my self fully about the Popes Patriarchate but in conclusion that which had been a cause of my trouble proved a meanes of my â—inall Satisfaction For seing it is generally confessed that the Bishop of Rome was a Patriarch I concluded that he could not be a Spirituall Monarch The reasons of my Resolution I have set down and received no answer Yet it shall not seem irksome to me to repeat them as desiring nothing but the discovery of the truth First I argue thus The Soveraign Government and the Subordinate Government of the same person in the same Society or body Politick or Ecclesiastick is inconsistent But the Popes pretended Monarchy or Supremacy of power over the whole Church and his Patriarchall Dignity in the same Church are a Soveraign and Subordinate Government of the same person in the same body Ecclesiastick The reason of the Major is because Soveraign power is single of one person or Society but this subordinate power is conjoint of fellow Patriarchs Soveraign Power is Vniversall but this subordinate power is particular And therefore as a Quadrangle cannot be a Triangle nor a King a Sherif of a Shire or a President of a Province within his own Kingdome so neither can the same person be an Vniversall Monarch and a particular Patriarch Secondly the Spirituall Soveraignty of the Roman Bishop is pretended to be by divine right his Patriarchall power is confessedly by humane right but a Spirituall Soveraignty by divine right and an inferiour dignity by humane right are inconsistent As it is absurd to say that God should make a man a Prince and after the people make him a Peer or God should give him a Greater Dignity and afterwards the people coÌ„ferre a lesse upon him Thirdly a Soveraignty above the CanoÌ„s besides the Canons against the Canons to make them to abrogate them to suspend them with a Non obstante to dispense with them at pleasure where the Canon gives no dispensative power and a Subjection to the Canons to be able to do nothing against them are inconsistent But suâ—h a Soveraign Power is above the Canons and such a Patriarchall power is subject to the Canons Therefore they are inconsistent All the answer he offereth to these two Instances the one that Bishop Vsher was at once Bishop of Armagh and as such the Bishop of Derries superiour I answer first he mistaketh much The Primacy of Ireland and the Archbishoprick of Armagh are not two diâ—â—inct dignities but one and the self same dignitie but the Monarchicall power of the Pope by divine right and his Patriarchall power by Humane right are two distinct dignities Secondly the Primate of Ireland is not indowed with Monarchicall power but all the difficulty here lieth in the Conjunction of Monarchicall power and Subordinate power His other Instance must a person leave of to be Master of his own Family because he is made King and his Authority extendeth over all England I answer first his Argument is a transition into another kind or an excursion from one kind of power to another from Politicall power in the Commonwealth to an Oeconomicall power in the Family Secondly it is one thing to make an inferiour person a King and another thing to make a King a Constable or to make Soveraignty and Subordination consist together When a King doth discharge the place of a Generall of an Army he acquireth no new dignity or power or place no man calleth him my lord Generall but he doth it as a King by his Kingly power to which no higher or larger power can be added but the Bishop of Rome did not doth not exercise Patriarchall power by virtue of his Monarchy by divine Ordination but by humane right first by Custome or prescription and then by authority of the Councell of Nice All the world seeth and acknowledgeth that the Bishop of Rome hath more power in his Bishoprick then he hath out of it in the rest of his Province aÌ„d more power in his Province then he hath out of it in his Patriarchate and more power in his own Patriarchate then he hath in anothers Patriarchate but if he had a Soveraignty of Power and Iurisdiction by Christs own Ordination he should have the same power every where if he had a Soveraignty of Power and Iurisdiction by Christs own Ordination then all Patriarchall power should flow from him as from the Originall Fountain of all Ecclesiaasticall honour But the Contrary is most apparent that all the Patriarchs even the Roman himself did owe their Patriarchall power to the Customes of the Church and Canons of the Fathers These are the reasons why I conceive Monarchicall Power and Patriarchall power to be inconsistent in one and the same persoÌ„ But the Pope was coÌ„fessedly a Patriarch therefore no Monarch The next thing which commeth to be observed is his ExceptioÌ„s to Dionothus the learned Abbat of Bangor his aÌ„swer to Austin professing Canonicall Obedience to the Archbishop of CaerleoÌ„ in his own name aÌ„d the name of the British Church and disclaiming all ObedieÌ„ce except of Brotherly love to the Bishop of Rome His first exception was the naming of the Bishop of Rome Pope without any Addition of Name or place contrary to the use of those times For aÌ„swer I committed him and his Friend Bellarmine together WheÌ„ the word Pope is put alone the Bishop of Rome onely is to be understood as appeareth out of the Councell of Chalcedon the most blessed and Apostolicall man the Pope doth command us this without adding Leo or Rome or the City of Rome or any other thing He sleighteth Bellarmine and rebuketh me for folly to think that Catholick writers cannot disagree and answereth the Councell that thought the word Pope be alone without Addition Yet which is equivalent the Comitant Circumstances sufficiently indigitate the person For the words were spokeÌ„ by Boniface the Popes Vicegerent As if there were not the same indigitating CircuÌ„stances here as well as there the words being spoken by Austin the Popes Legate and Vicar as well as Boniface in the name of Pope Gregory to the Britons which were answered here by Dinoth His second exception to Dinoths Testimony is that there was no such Bishoprick as Caerleon in those dayes the See being removed from Caerleon to Menevia or S. Davids fifty yeares before this That it was removed before this I acknowledge but how long before this is uncertain Some Authors make S. Gregory and S. David to have died
power to name and constitute two and thirty Commissioners sixteen of the Clergy and other sixteen of the Peers and Parliament to view the Ecclesiasticall Lawes of the Kingdome and declare which were fit to be retained and which were to be abrogated The same Law is confirmed and enlarged The Sixth Law restreineth the payment of Tenths and First Fruits to the Bishop of Rome And prescribeth how Arch-bishops Bishops c. are to be elected and consecrated within the Realm without payment of any thing to Rome for Bulls and Pals c. The seventh law is an Act of Eâ—oneration of the Kings subjects from exactions and impositions heretofore paid to the See of Rome for Pensions Peterpence Licenses Dispensations Confirmations faculties c. and for having licenses and dispensations within the Realm without further suing for the same As being Vsurpations coâ—trary to the law of the land The eighth Act is Concerning the Kings Highnesse to be supreme Head of the Church of England that is Politicall head and to have Authority to redresse all Errours Heresies and Abuses in the same That is to say with externall Coactive Iurisdiction Wee never gave our Kings the power of the Keys or any part of either the Key of Order or the Key of Iurisdiction purely Spirituall but onely that Coactive power in the externall Regiment of the Church which their Predecessors had alwayes enjoyed The Ninth Act is for the annexing Tenths and first fruits to the Crown for the better supportation of the Burthens of the Commouwealth The tenth Act is au Act extinguâ—shing the Authority of the Bishop of Rome or extirpating it out of this Realm That is Not the Bishop of Romes Primacy of Order Not his beginning of Vnity Not that respect which is dne to him as Bishop of an Apostolicall See If he have not these it is his own fault This is not our quarrell It is so far from it that wee do not envy him any just legacies of Christian Emperours or Generall Councells But that which our Ancestors did extinguish and endeavour to extirpate out of England was the Popes externall Coactive power over the Kings Subjects in foro contentioso as wee shall see by and by when we come to state the quarrell rightly between us After this Act there followed au eleventh Act made for corroborating of this last Act to exclude the usurped power and Iurisdiction of the Bishops of Rome And both these Acts are backed with new Oaths as those times were fruitfull of Oaths such as they were The last Act of any moment was an Act of Ratification of the Kings Majestjes Style of Supreme head of the Church of England making it treason to attempt to deprive the King of it But as well the eighth Act which gave the King that title of the Head of the Church as this twelfth Act which makes it treason to attempt to deprive the King of it are both repealed and never were restored So are likewise the tenth Act of extinguishing the Authority of the Bishop of Rome and the eleventh act made for corroboration of that Act with both their Oaths included in them All that hath been added since of moment which concerneth the Bishop of Rome is one Act Restoring to the Crown the ancient Iurisdiction over the State Ecclesiasticall and Spirituall and abolishing all forrain power repugnant to the same Here is no power created in the Crown but onely an ancient Iurisdiction restored Here is no forrein power abolished but onely that which is repugnant to the ancient Lawes of England and to the Prerogative Royall In a word here is no power ascribed to our Kings but meerly Politicall aud Coactive to see that all their Subjects doe their Dutyes in their severall places Coactive power is one of the Keys of the Kingdome of this world it is none of the Keys of the Kingdome of Heaven This might have been expressed in Words lessé subject to exception But the case is clear The Grand Act xxv Hen. 8. cap. 12 The Injunctions of Queen Elizabeth The Articles of our Chutch Art 37. doe all proclaime that this power is merely Politicall Christ gave St. Peter a Commission to preach to baptise to bind and loose in the Court of Conscience but where did he give him a Commission to give Licenses to grant Facultyes to make Lawes to dispense with lawes to receive appeales to impose Tenths and First fruits in other mens Kingdomes whether the right owner will or no Who gave him power to take other mens Subjects against their Wills to be his Officers and Apparitors That is more power then Christ himself did challenge here upon Earth And now Reader take a Stand and looke about thee See among all these Branches of Papall power which were cast out of England if thou caust find either of St. Peters Keys or his Primacy of Order or his Beginning of Vnity or anything which is purely Spirituall that hath no further influence then merely the Court of Conscience No but on the other side behold a pack of the grossest Usurpations that ever were hatched and all so late that is was above a thousand years after the death of S. Peter be fore any of his pretended Privileges did see the sun in England observe them one by one The first is a power to dispense with English Subjects for holding Plurality of Benifices contrary to the Lawes of England And for non Residents contrary to the Statutes of the Realm It had been much to have made Merchandise of his own Decrees but to Dispense with the Lawes of the Land Non auderet haec facere Viduae mulieri He durst not doe so much to a poore widow woman as he did to the Church and Kingdome of England to dispense with their Lawes at his pleasure It is but vain for the Flower of our Kingdome to assemble aud consult about healthfull Lawes if a Forrainer have power to dispense with the breach of them as it seemeth good in his Eyes They might as well sit them downquietly fall to pilling of rushes The second Branch of Papall power which was Excluded out of England was the Popes Iudiciary power I doe not mean in Controversies of Faith when he is in the Head of a councell Yet Eugeniur the fourth confesseth that in points of Faith the sentence of the councel is rather to be atteÌ„ded theÌ„ the sentence of the Pope But I mean in points of meum and tuum not onely in some rare cases between Bishop and Bishop which had been lesse intollerable and had had more shew of Iustice but generally in all cases promiscuously as if the whole nation wanted either discretion or Law to determin their own differences at home without the help of the Roman Courtier tosqueese their purses It was not Henry the eighth but the old Lawes of England which gave them this blow against Appeales to Rome The third Branch of papall
after Eleuen hundred years were eâ—â—luxed a strange time to set up a divine right Gregory the seventh otherwise called Pope Hildebrand and after him Pope Calixtus did condemne all Investitures taken from a Lay hand aud prohibit the Arch Bishops to cousecrate any persons so invested Praesens audivi in Romano Concilio prohiberi saith Anselm I heard it with mine own eares prohibited in the Roman Court But what were their reasons I believe not overrigorous Demonstrations The first was frequent suspicion of Simony An unheard of piece of Iustice to take away an hereditary right for suspicion of a personall fault The second and third reasons are contained in the letter of Adrian the fourth to Frederick the first Apud Goldast Ab his qui Dii sunt filii excelsi omnes homagium requiâ—is Fidelitatem exigis manus eorum sacratas manibus tuis innectis Thou requirest homage of those who are Gods and all the Children of the most High thou exactest an Oath of Fidelity and knittest their sacred hands with in thy hands A strange presumtion in a Soveraign Prince if you marke it well to hold his subjects hands within his Hands whilest he was swearing his Allegiance But the maine exception was the Homage or Oath of Fidelity it self And was it not high time thinke you to except against their swearing of Fidelity to their Native Prince whom the Bishops of Rome intended to exempt from his Iurisdiction aud to make them turn Subjects to themselves as they did in a great part effect it very shortly after Then was the time where of Platina speaks that there was great Consultation about the Homage and Fealty and Oaths of Bishops which in former times were sworn to lay men Were they so indeed Here is an ingenuous Confession of the Popes own Library Keeper Indeed at the first whilest they were robbing the King of the Iewells of his Crown they preached up nothing but free Elections but after they had onte seised their prey they changed their once forthwith to Dei Apostolicae Sedis Graria By the Grace of God and the Apostolique See Or ex plenitudine Ecclefiasticae potestatis out of the Fulnesse of our Ecclesiasticall power And when this Bell had rung out a while Egypt never a bounded more with Caterpillars then our Native Country did with Provisions and reservations and Pensions with all theÌ„hellish arts of Sublimated Simony Then our best dignityes and Benefices were filled with Strangers who could not speak an English word nor did ever tread upon English ground dayly more and more untill these well chosen Pastors who knew how to sheare their Flocks though they did not know how to feed them received yearly out of the Kingdome more theu the revenues of the crown He were very simple who should thinke the Court of Rome did not lick their own Fingers There remaineth but one thing to be done to stick the Guilt of this intolerable Vsurpation undeniably upon the See of Rome that is to sâ—ew that the Investiture of Bishops was the undoubted right of the Crown This is as cleare as the Sun both in our most Authentick Historiographers and records if I had the meanes to producetheÌ„ and also in our ancient Lawes published long since to the world in print and these not enactive of new law but declarative of the fundamentall law of the land First for our Histories Gervasius Dorobernensis relateth that Lanfrank desired of William the conquerer the Patronage of the Abby of S. Austin but the King answered Se velle omnes baculos pastorales in manu tenere That he would keep all the Crosier staffes that is the Investitures in his own hand The same is testified Anselm himself by one whose Authority cannot be doubted of He Anselm after the manner and Example of his Predecessor was inducted according to the Custome of the Land and did Homage to the King homo Regis factus est as Lanfranke his Predecessor in the Archbishoprick of Canterbury in his time had done And the manner of his Investiture is related how the Bishops pulled him and haled him as it were by violence to the Kings bedside William Rufus where he lay sick and helped to thrust the Crosier staffe by force into his hand Yet all that time though Anselm had many other Pretenses he had no exception against Investiture by a Lay hand but shortly after it grew to such an height and Anselm was the chief Stickler in it that William the Agent of King Henry the First protested openly to Pope Paschall Whatsoever is said on this side or on that I would have all men here present to know that my Lord the King of England will not suffer the losse of his Investitures for the losse of his Kingdome To whom Pope Paschall answered as resolutely but not so justly Know thou I speake it before God that Paschall the Pope will not suffer him to keep them without punishment no not for the redemtion of his head Neither was this the case of Anselm or Lanfranke alone but the commoÌ„ case of all Bishops in those dayes Hear the confession of the same author To conclude the very cause of the difference between the King and Anselm seemed a new thing or innovation to this our age and unheard of to the English from the time that the Normans began to Reign that I say not sooner For from the time that William the Norman conquered that Land no Bishop or Abbat was made before Anselm who did not first doe Homage to the King and from his hand by the gift of a Crosier staffe receive the investiture to his Bishoprick or Abbacy except two Bishops of Rochester who were Surrogates to the Arch Bishop of Canterbury and inducted by him by the Kings Concession Yea by his Favour so did Anselm himself Though he sought afterwards to wave it And though he be loath to speak out That I say not sooner Yet he might have said sooner and others doe say sooner as Ingulph the Abbat of Crowland in the time of the Conquerer For many yeares past there hath been no free Election of Prelates but the Kings Court did conferre all dignities according to their pleasure by a Ring and by a Crosier And this Custome had held not onely for Many yeares but for many Ages king Edgar did grant to the monkes of Glastenbury the free Election of their Abbat for ever but he reserved to him self and to his Heirs the power to invest the Brother elected by the tradition of the Pastorall staffe Thus for our histories now for our Lawes where of I shall need to cite but three The First is the Statute or Assise or Memoriall of Clarendon containing part of the ancient Liberties and Customes of the Realme made in the Generall assembly of the Kingdome King Bishops Peers to which they gave both their oathes assertory for the truth of it and Promissory for performance of it The
Church of England Lastly these Papall Oaths doe necessarily suppose a Voiage to Rome either to take the Oath there or if the Oath was sent them into England one Clause in the Oathâ—was that they should come to Rome in person to receive the Popes Commands within a prefixed time But this is directly contrary to the Lawes of England which allow no Subject Clergiman or other to goe to Rome without the Kings Leave Thus much both the Prelates and Peers of the Realm told Anselm when he had a miâ—d to visit the Pope Thus much wee find attested by the Generall Assembly of the Kingdome in the Statute or Assise of Clarendon where one of the Customes or Lawes of the Kingdome is That No Ecclesiasticall person might depart out of the Kingdome without the Kings License No not though he were expresly summoned by the Bishop of Rome And at a Parliament held at Northampton in the Reign of Henry the third it was enacted that if any persons departed out of the Kingdome un lesse they would return within a prefixed time and answer it in the Court of our Lord the King let them be outlawed This was the unanimous complaint of the whole Kingdome to the Pope That the English were drawn out of the Realm by his authority contrary to the Customes of the Kingdome No Clergy man may goe to Rome without the Kings License say the ancient Lawes of the Realm Every English Prelateâ— shall come to Rome upon my command saith the Pope What Oedipus can reconcile the English Lawes and Papall mandates Commonly good Lawes proceed from evill manners and abuses doe ordinarily precede their Remedies But by the Providence of our Ancestors our English Remedies were preexistent before their Vsurpations Non remittitur Peccaâ—um nisi restituatur ablatum Vntill they restore those rights whereof they have robbed the King and Kingdome Wee may pardon them but they can hope for no forgivenesse from God I will conclude this point with an ancient Fundamentall Law in the Britannick Island anotherâ—Prince â—Prince professing Fidelity and obedience to any one besides the King Let him lose his head I come now to the last Branch of the first Papall Vsurpation Tenths and First fruits If Christ be still crucifyed between two Thieves it is between an old overgrown Officer of the Roman Court and a Sacrilegious Precisian The one is so much for the Splendour of Religion and the other for the Purity of Religion that between themâ— thâ—y destroy Religion Their Faces like Samsons Foxes locke contrary wayes but both of them have Firebrands at their tailes both of them prate of Heaven altogether both of them have their hearts nailed to the Earth On the one side if it had not been for the Avaricious Practises of the Roman Court the Papacy might have beeÌ„ a great advantage to the ChristiaÌ„ world in point of Order and Vnity at least it had not been so intolerable a BurtheÌ„ It is feared these will not suffer an Eugenius an Adrian or an Alexander to be both honest and long-lived On the otherside these Counterfeit Zelots do but renew the Policy of the two old Sicilian Gluttons to blow their Noses in the dishes that they might devour the meate alone that is cry down Church Revenues as Superstitious and Dangerous because they gape after them themselves If it were not for these two factioÌ„s wee might hope to see a reconciliation Self interest and self profit are both the procreating and conserving cause of Disunion Who would Imagin that the large Patrimony of St. Peter should not conteÌ„t or suffice an old Bishop abundantly without preying upon the poore Clergy for Tenths and First fruits and God knowes how many other waies The Revennes of that See were infinite yet the Bishops of ten complained of Want Gods blessing did not goe along with these Ravenous Courses So Pharohs lean Kine devoured the fat yet were nothing the Fatter them selves The first Tenth which the Pope had from the English Clergy was onely a single Tenth of their moveable Goods not by way of Imposition but as a Benevolence or free gift out of Courtesy But the Roman Bishops having once tasted the sweet meant not to give over so Non missura cutem nisi plena cruoris â—irudo The next step was to impose Tenths upon the Clergy not in perpetuity or as a certain Revenue due to the Papacy but for a fixed number of yeares as a stock for the Defence of Christendome against the incursions of the Turke About the same time First fruits began to be exacted not generally but onely of the Popes own Clerkes as a Gratuity or in plain English as a handsome Cloak of Simony But he that perfected the Work and made both Tenths and First fruits a certain annuall Revenue to the See of Rome was Boniface the ninth or Iohn the two and twentieth his Successor so saith Platina And with him almost all other writers doe agree This Boniface lived about the year fourteen hundred whom Turselline maketh to have been the restorer of Papall Majesty whose prudence did transcend his Age for he was but thirty yeares old He was the Vsurper that tooke away from the Romans the free choise of their Magistrates Iohn the two and twentieth lived in the time of the Councell of Constance some thing above the fourteen hundreth yeare It was he that called the Councell and was him self deposed by the Councell for grievous Crimes and the payment of First fruits abolished For neither the paiment of Tenths nor First fruits did agree with the palate of the Councells of Constance and Basile Notwithstanding their gilded pretences The Councell of Constance decreed that it was not lawfull for the Bishop of Rome to impose any Indictions or Exactions upon the Church or upon Ecclesiasticall persons in the Nature of a Tenth or any other way Which Decree was passed in the nineteenth Session though it be related afterward According to this Decree Pope Martin issued out his Mandate Wee Command that the Lawes which prohibit Tenths and other Burthens to be imposed by the Pope upon Churches and Ecclesiasticall persons be observed more Strictly And the Councell of Baâ—ill Commandeth that as well in the Roman Court as elswhere c Nothing be exacted for Tenths or Firstfruits c. But for all this the Popes could not hold their Hands Leo the tenth made a new imposition for three yeares Ad triennium proxime futurum for the old ends And it should seem that their mind was that thence forward as the cause lasted so should the imposition But the Germane Nation were not of the same mind who made this their nineteenth Grievance for as much as concerneth Tenth which Ecclesiasticall Prelates paid yearely to the Pope which the Germane Princes some yeares since did consent unto that they should be paid to the See of Rome for a certain time upoÌ„ Condition that this money should be
is the Keeper of both the Tables and wee say that for the first Table the Bishops ought to be his Interpreters Thirdly as wee question not the Popes legislative or coactive power over his own subjects so we submit to the judgemeÌ„t of the Catholick church whether he ought to have a primacy of order as the successour of S. Peter and as a consequent thereof a right if he would content himself with it to summoÌ„ Councells when and where there are no Christian Soveraignes to doe it and to joyne with other Bishops in making spirituall Lawes or Canons such as the Apostles made and such as the primitive Bishops made before there were christiaÌ„ Emperours But then those Canons are the Lawes of the Church not of the Pope As those Canons in the Acts of the Apostles were the Lawes of the Apostolicall College The Apostles and Elders and Brethren not the Lawes of S. Peter Then their Lawes have no Coactive Obligation to compell Christians in the outward Court of the Church against their Wills or further then they are pleased to submit theÌ„selves All exteriour coactive power is from the Soveraigne Prince and therefore when and where Emperours and Kings are Christians to them it properly belongeth to summon Councells and to confirm their Canons thereby making them become lawes Because Soveraign Princes onely have power to License and Command their Subjects to Assemble to assign fit places for their Assembling to protect them in their Assemblyes and to give a Coactive power to their Lawes without which they may doe their best to drive away Wolves and to oppose Heriticks but it must be with such Armes as Christ had furnished them withall that is persuasions Prayers Teares and at the most seperating them from the Communion of the faithfull and leaving them to the Iudgement of Christ. The Controversy is then about new upstart Papall Lawes either made at Rome such are the decretalls of Gregory the ninth Boniface the eighth Clement the fifth and succeeding Popes Or made in England by Papall Legates as Otho and Othobone Whether the Pope or his Legates have power to make any such Lawes to bind English Subjects and compell them to obey them against their Wills the King of England contradicting it The first time that ever any Canon of the Bishop of Rome or any legislative Legate of his was attempted to be obtruded upon the King or Church of England was eleven hundred yeares after Christ. The first Law was the Law against taking Investitures to Bishopricks from a Lay hand And the first Legate that ever presided in an English Synod was Iohannes Cremensis of both which I have spoken formerly Observe Reader and be astonished if thou hast so much faith to believe it That the Pope should pretend to a legislative power over British and English Subjects by divine right and yet never offer to put it in execution for above eleven hundred yeares It remaineth now to prove evidently that Henry the eighth by his Statute made for that purpose did not take away from the Bishop of Rome any Privilege which he and his Predecessors had held by Inheritance from St. Peter and been peaceably possessed of for fifteen hundred yeares But on the contrary that eleven hundred yeares after St. Peter was dead the Bishops of Rome did first invade the right of the Crown of England to make Lawes for the externall Regiment of the Church which the Predecessors of Henry the eighth had enjoyed peaceably untill the dayes of William Rufus nemine contradicente And that the Kings Lawes were evermore acknowledged to be true Lawes and obligatory to the English Subjects but that the Popes decrees were never esteemed to be binding Lawes in England except they were incorporated in to our Lawes by the King and Church or Kingdome of England Whence it followeth by irrefragable consequence that Henry the eighth was not the Schismatick in this particular but the Pope and those that maintain him or adhere to him in his Vsurpations First for the Kings right to make Lawes not onely concerning the outward RegimeÌ„t of the Church but even coÌ„cerning the Keys of Order and jurisdiction so far as to oblige them who are trusted with that power by the Church to doe their dutyes it is so evident to every one who hath but cast his Eyes upon our English Lawes that to bestow labour on proving it were to bring Owles to Athens Their Lawes are extant made in all Ages concerning faith and good Manners Heresy Holy Orders the Word the Sacraments Bishops Priests Monkes the Privileges and Revenues of Holy Church Marriages Divorces Simony The Pope his SenteÌ„ces his oppressions and usurpations Prohibitions Appeales from Eeclesiasticall judges and generally all things which are of Ecclesiasticall Cognifance and this in those times which are acknowledged by the Romanists themselves to have been Catholick More then this they inhibited the Popes own Legate to attempt to decree any thing contrary to the Kings Crown and dignity And if they approved the decrees of the Popes Legates they confirmed them by their Royall Authority and so incorporated them into the Body of the English Lawes Secondly that the Popes decrees never had the force of Lawes in England without the Confirmation of the King Witnesse the decrees of the Councell of Lateran as they are commonly called but it is as cleare as the day to any one who readeth the eleveÌ„th the six and fortieth and the one and sixtieth Chapters that they were not made by the Councell of Lateran but some time after perhaps not by InnoceÌ„t the third but by some succeeding Pope For the author of them doth distinguish himself expresly from the Councell of Lateran It was well provided in the Councell of Lateran c. But because that statute is not observed in many Churches we confirming the foresaid statute doe adde c. Again It is known to have been prohibited in the councel of Lateran c. But we inhibiting the same moro strongly c. How soever they were the Popes decrees but never were received as Lawes in England as wee see evidently by the third Chapter That the Goods of Clergimen being convicted of Heresy be forfeited to the Church That all Officiers Secular and Ecclesiasticall should take an Oath at their Admission into their Office to their power to purge their Territories from Heresy That if a Temporall Lord did neglect being admonished by the Church to purge his Lands from Heresy he should be excommunicated And if he contemned to satisfy within a yeare the Pope should absolve his Subjects from their Allegiance And by the three and fortieth Chapter That no Ecâ—â—â—siasticall person be compelled to swear allegiance to a Lay man And by the six and fortieth Chapter that Ecclesiasticall persons be free from taxes Wee never had any such Lawes all Goods forfeited in that kind were ever confiscated to the King We never had any such Oaths Every one is to answer for himself We know
the Prejudice of the Decrees of Generall Councells or the Privileges of the French Church Then he must give no Dispensarions against the Canons or Contrary to those Privileges Thus we have viewed all the reall differences between the Church of Rome and us concerning Papall power which our Lawes take notice of There are some other petâ—y Abuses which we complain of but they may be all referred to one of these four heads The Patronage of the Church of England The Legislative The Judicary and Dispensative powers Other differences are but the Opinions of particular Persons But where no Law is there is no Transgression Wee have seen evidently that Henry the eighth did cast no Branch of Papall power out of England but that which was diametrally repugnant to the Ancient Lawes of the Land made in the Reign of Henry the fourth Richard the second Edward the third Edward the first Henry the third Henry the second And these Lawes ever of Force in England never repealed no not so much as in Queen Maryes time when all the Lawes of Henry the eighâ—h and Edward the sixth which concerned the Bishop of Rome were repealed So that I professe clearly I doe not see what advantage Henry the eighth could make of his own Lawes which he might not have made of those ancieÌ„t lawes except onely a gawdy title of Head of the English Church which survived him not long and the Tenths and first fruits of the Clergy which was so late an usurpation of the Pope that it was not in the nature of things wheÌ„ those ancient lawes were made And since I have mentioned the Novelty of that upstart Vsurpation give me leave to let you see how it was welcommed into England whilest it was but yet hatching with the shell upon the Head of it By a Law of Henry the fourth about an Hundred yeares before Henry the eyghth so late this Mushrom began to sprout up For the grievous Complaints made to the King by his Commons in Parliament of the horrible Mischiefs and Damnable Custome which is introduced of new in the Church of Rome that none could have Provision of an Archbishoprick untill he had compounded with the Popes Chamber to pay great excessive summes of money as well for the First fruits as other lesser Fees and Perquisites c The King ordeineth in Parliament as well to the Honour of God as to eschew the Dammage of the Realm and perill of soules That whosoever shall pay such summes should forfeit all they had or as much as they might forfeit Wherein are Henry the eights Lawes more bitter against the Bishop of Rome or more severe then this is To conclude we have seen the precise time when all these Weeds did first begin to peep out of the earth The very first Introduction to the intended Pageant was the spoiling of Christian Kings of the Patronage of the Church which Bellarmine confesseth that they held Per non breve tempus For a long time A long time indeed so long as there had been Christian Princes in the world from Constantine the Great to Henry the fourth in the Empire and yet longer with us in Brittaine from King Lucius to Henry the First The Clergy of Liege say Nimium effluxit tempus quo haeâ— consuetudo incepit e. It is too long since this Custome of swearing fidelity to Princes did begin Aud under this Custome Holy and Reverend Bishops have yielded up their soules to God giving to Caesar that which was Caesars and to God that which was Gods But theÌ„ rose up Pope Hildebrand otherwise called Gregory the seventh Fortissimus Ecclesiae Dei Vindex The most undaunted Vindicator of the Church of God Who feared not to revoke and defend the old Holy Ecclesiasticall Lawes With this accordeth the Church of Liege Hildehran dus Papa Author hujus Novelli Schismatis primus Levavit Sacerdotalem Lanceam contra Diadema Regni c. Pope Hildebrand the author of this new Schisme first lift up his Episcopall Lance against the Royall diadeÌ„ And a little after Si utriusque Legis totam Bibliothecam c. If I turn over the whole Library of the old and new Law and all the ancient Expositors thereof I shall not find an Example of this Apostolicall precept onely Pope Hildebrand perfected the Sacred Canons when he Commanded Maud the Marchionesse to subdue Henry the Emperour for remission of her Sinnes I take no exceptions to the person of Pope Hildebrand others have done it sufficiently Whether the Title of Antichrist was fastened upon him justly or injustly I regard not Yet it was in the time of this Hildebrand and Paschalis his Successor that the Arch-bishop of Florence affirmed by revelatioÌ„ for he protested that he knew it most certainly that Antichrist was to be revealed in that age And about this time the Waldenses of whom St. Bernard saith that if we inquire into their Faith nothing was more Christian if into their Conversation nothing was more irreprehensible made their Secession from the Bishop of Rome And not long after in the yeare 1120. published a Booke to the world that the great Antichrist was come That the present Governers of the Roman Church armed with both Powers Secular and Spirituall who under the specious Name of the Spouse of Christ did oppose the right way of Salvation were Antichrist But I cannot but wonder what are those old holy Ecclesiasticall Lawes which Bellarmine mentioneth Those Institutions of the Holy Fathers which Hildebrand himself professeth to follow Sanctorum Patrum instituta sequenâ—es Why doe they mention what they are not able to produce or pretend what they never can perform Bellarmin hath named but one poore counterfeit Canon without Antiquity without Authority without Vse without Truth If Mr. Serjeant be able to help him with a recruit it would come very seasonably for without some such helps his pretended Institutions of the Fathers will be condemned for his own Innovations and for arrant Vsurpations and the Guilt of Schism will fall upon the Roman Court. Sect. I. Cap. IX But I expect it should be objected that besides these Statutes which concern the Patronage of the English Church the Legislative the Iudiciary the Dispensative power of Popes there are two other Statutes made by Henry the eighth The one an Act for extinguishing the Authority of the Bishop of Rome The other an Act for establishing the Kings Succession in the Crown wherein there is an Oath that the Bishop of Rome ought not to have any Iurisdiction or Authority in this Realm And that it is declared in the 37. Article of our Church that the Bishop of Rome hath no Iurisdiction in this Kingdome of England And in the Oath ordained by Queen Elisabeth That no Forrein Prelate hath or ought to have any Iurisdiction or Authority Ecclesiasticall or Spirituall with in this Realm I answer this Objection three wayes First as to the two Lawes
our Church witnesse the Professions of King Iames witnesse all our Statutes themselves wherein all the parts of Papall power are enumerated which are taken away His Entroachments his Vsurpations his Oaths his Collations Provisions Pensions Tenths First fruits Reservations Palls Vnions Commendams Exemptions Dispensations of all kinds Confirmations Licenses Faculties Suspensions Appeales and God knoweth how many pecuniary Artifices more but of them all there is not one that concerneth Iurisdiction purely Spirituall or which is an essentiall right of the power of the Keys They are all Branches of the Externall Regiment of the Church the greater part of them usurped from the Crowne sundry of them from Bishops and some found out by the Popes themselves as the payment for Palls which was nothing in S. Gregoryes time but a free gift or liberality or bounty free from imposition and exaction Lastly consider the grounds of all our grievances expressed frequently in our Lawes and in other writers The disinheriting of the Prince and Peers The destruction and Anullation of the Lawes and the Prerogative Royall The Vexation of the King Liege people The impoverishing of the Subjects the draining the Kingdome of its treasure The decay of Hospitality The disservice of God And filling the Churches of England with Forreiners The excluding Temporall Kings and Princes out of their Dominions The Subjecting of the Realm to spoil and ravine grosse Simoniacall contracts Sacrilege Grievous and intolerable oppressioÌ„s and extortions Iurisdiction purely Spirituall doth neither disinherit the Prince nor the Peers nor destroy and anull the Lawes and Prerogative royall nor vex the Kings Liege people nor impoverish the Subject nor draine the Kingdome of its Treasures nor fill the Churches with Forreiners nor exclude Temporall Kings out of their Dominions nor subject the Realm to spoile and Ravine Authority purely spirituall is not guilty of the decay of Hospitality or disservice of Almighty God or Simony or Sacrilege or oppressions and extortions No No it is the externall regiment of the Church by new Roman Lawes and Mandates by new Roman Sentences and Iudgements by new Roman Pardons and dispensations by new Roman Synods and Oaths of Fidelity by new Roman Bishops and Clerkes It is your new Roman Tenths and First fruits and Provisions and Reservations and Pardons and Indulgences and the rest of those horrible mischiefs and damnable Customs that are apparently guilty of all these evills These Papall Innovations we have taken away indeed and deservedly having shewed the expresse time and place and person when and where and by whom every one of them was first introduced into England And we have restored to every Bird his own Feather To the King his Politicall Supremacy to the Peers their Patronages to the Bishops that Iurisdiction which was due to them either by Divine right or Humane right More then these Innovations we have taken nothing away that I know of Or rather it is not wee nor Henry the eighth who did take these Innovations away but our Ancesters by their Lawes three foure five hundred yeares old so soone as they began to sprout out or indeed before they were well formed as their Statutes yet extant doe evidence to the world But that filth which they swept out at the Fore doore the RomaÌ„ Emissaryes brought in again at the back doore All our part or share of this worke was to confirm what our ancesters had done I see no reason why I might not conclude my discourse upon this Subject Mutatis Mutandis with as much Confidence as Sanders did his visible Monarchy Quisquis jurabit per Viventem in aeternum c. Whosoever shall sweare by him that liveth for ever that the Church of England is not Schismaticall in respect of any Branches of Papall power which shee hath cast out at the Reformation he shall not forswear himself But Wagers and Oaths and Protestations are commonly the Arguments of such as have got the wrong end of the staffe I will shut up this long Discourse concerning Henry the eighths Reformation with a short Apostrophe to my Countrymen of the Roman Communion in England They have been taâ—ght that it is we who Apostate from the Faith of our Ancesters in this point of the Papacy that it is we who renounce the Vniversall and perpetual Tradition of the Christian world Whereas it is we who maintain ancient Apostolicall Tradition against their upstart Innovations whereas it is we who doe propugne the Cause of our Ancesters against the Court of Rome If our Ancesters were Catholick in this Cause we cannot be Schismaticall Let them take heed least whilst they fly oâ—t of a Panicall Feare from a supposed Schisme they doe not plunge themselves over head and eares into reall Schisme Let theÌ„ choose whether they will joine with their Ancesters in this cause or with the Court of Rome for with both they cannot joine If true English blood run in their veins they cannot be long deliberating about that which their Ancesters even all the Orders of the Kingdome voted unanimously That they would stand by their King and maintaine the rights of his Imperiall Crown against the Vsurpations of the Roman Court. I have represented clearly to you the true Controversy betweeÌ„ the Church and Kingdome of England and the Court of Rome concerning Papall power not as it is stated by private writers but in our English Lawes a glasse that cannot deceive us for so farre as to let us see the right Difference Let them quit these grosse Vsurpations Why should they be more ashamed to restore our lust rights then they were to plunder us of them Let them distinguish between Iurisdiction purely Spirituall and Iurisdiction in the exteriour Court which for the much greatest part of it is Politicall between the power of the Sword which be longeth to the Civill Soveraign and not to the Church further then he hath been graciously pleased to communicate it between that Obedience with procedeth from feare of wrath or from feare of Gods Revenger to execute wrath that is the Soveraign Prince and that Obedience which proceedeth meerly from conscience And then there is hope we may come to understand one another better It is true there are other Differences between us but this is the main Difference which giveth Denomination to the Parties And when they come to presse those Differences they may come to have such another account as they have now The wider the hole groweth in the middle of the Milstone Men see clearer through it Dies Diei eructat verbum nox nocti indicaâ— Scientiam The latter day is the Schollar of the former Sect. I. Cap. X. BY this time wee see that Mr. Serjeants great Dispatch will prove but a sleevelesse Errand and that his First Movership in the Church which he thought should have born down all before it is an unsignificant expression and altogether impertinent to the true Controversy between them and us Vnlesse as Dido did encompasse the
as he calleth them do not baffle him and trip up his heeles I pleaded that Roman Catholicks did make the first separation He answers that this Plea doth equally acquit any Villain in the World who insists in the steps of his Forefather Villains Would no expression lower then this of Villains serve his turâ—e Who can help it If those Forefathers whom he intimates were Villains or any thing like Villains they were his Forefathers twenty times more then ours We inherit but one point in difference from them but he twenty The denomination ought to be from the greater part If any of them were deemed more propitious to us then the rest it was Henry the eighth or Archbishop Cranmer For both these we have their own confession that they were theirs First for Henry the eight We had a King who by his Lawes abolished the Authority of the Pope although in all other things he would follow the faith of his Ancestours And for Archbishop Cranmer heare another of them Cranmer the unworthy Archbishop of Canterbury was his the Earle of Hartfords right hand and chiefe Assistant in the work although but a few moneths before he was of King Harries Religion yea a great Patron and Prosecuter of the six Articles But to deale clearly with you there is not the same reason to imitate a notorious knave in his confessed knavery and to follow one who hath not onely a reasonable and just cause of contending but also the reputation of an honest man even in the judgement of his adverse party in all other things except onely therein wherein he is adverse to them Such were all the Actors in this cause by their Confession If we acknowledged that they who cast out Papall Vsurpations were Schismaticks for so doing he said something but we justify their Act as pious and virtuous and so his Comparison hath never a leg to run on I pleaded that it was a violent presumption of their Guilt and our Innocence when their best Friends and best able to Iudge who preached for them and writ for them who acted for them and suffered for theÌ„ who in all other things were great Zelots of the Roman Religion and persecuted the poore ProtestaÌ„ts with fire and fagot yet coÌ„demne theÌ„ and justify this seperarioÌ„ He minceth what I say according to his use and then excepteth The word best might have been left out They ever were accounted better Friends who remained in their former faith and the other Bishops looked upon as Schismaticks by the Obedient party Yet the Bishop of Chalcedon doubted not to call them the best of Bishops He should do well to tell us for his credits sake who those other Bishops were who looked upon these as Schismaticks Such is his ignorance in the State of these times that he dreameth of two parties an Obedient Party and a Rebellious Party whereas there were no Parties but all went one way There was not a Bishop nor an Abbot of Note in the Kingdome who did not vote the Kings Supremacy Four and twenty Bishops and five and twenty Abbots personally at one time There was not a Bishop nor any person of note in the Kingdome who did not take the Oath of the Kings Supremacy except Bishop Fisher and S. Thomas Moore who were imprisoned for treason either true or pretended before that Act was made for opposing the Succession of the Crown If he will not trust me let him trust the Veredict of our Vniversities A length we all agreed unanimously in this Sentencâ— and were of one accord that the Roman Bishop hath no greater Iurisdiction given him by God in holy Scripture in this Kingdome of England then any other Forrain Bishop The same Sentence was given by our Convocations or Synods The same Sentence was given by our Parliaments with the same concord and Vnanimity Nemine Dissentiente We had no parties but one and all Let him listen to his Friend Bishop Gardiner No Forrain Bishop hath any Authority among us all sorts of people are agreed with us upon this point with most stedfast consent that no manner of person bred or brought up in England hath ought to doe with Rome And Ireland was unanimoâ—s herein with England All the great Families as well of the Irish as of the English did acknowledge by their Indentures to S. Anthony St. Leger then chiefe Governour of Ireland the Kings Supremacy and utterly renounce the Iurisdiction of the Pope Yet it was not the meaning of our Ancestours then and though some of them had been so minded it is not our meaning now to meddle with the power of the Keys or abridge the Bishop of Rome of any Iurisdiction purely spirituall or any Legacy which was left him by Christ or his Apostles but onely to cast out his usurped Coactive power in the exteriour Court without the leave of the Soveraign Prince which Christ and his Apostles did never exercise or dispose of or meddle with and to vindicate to our Kings the Politicall or externall Regiment of the Church by themselves and by their Bishops and other fit delegates as a Right due to all Christian Princes by the Law of God and nature But he attributeth all this to the Feare of the Clergy and the people and the Kings violent Cruelty and for proofe of what he saith citeth half a passage out of Doctor Hammond but he doth Dr. Hammond notorious wrong Dr. Hammond speaketh onely of the first preparatory act which occasioned them to take the matter of right into a serious debate in a Synodicall way he applieth it to the subsequent act of Renunciation after debate Dr. Hammond said onely it is easy to be believed Mr. Serjeant maketh it a just Presumption or confest Evidence Dr. Hammond speaketh of no feare but the feare of the law the law of Premunire an ancient law made many ages before Henry the eighth was borne the Palladium of England to preserve it from the Vsurpations of the Court of Rome but he misapplieth it wholy to the feare of he Kings violent Cruelty Lastly he smothers Dr. Hammonds Sense expressed clearly by himself that there is no reason to doubt but that they did believe what they did professe the feare being the Occasion of their debates but the reasons or Arguments offered in debate the causes as in all Charity we are to Iudge of their decision He useth not to cite any thing ingenuously If he did he could have told his Reader that this answer was taken away by me before it was made by him For two whole Kingdomes the Vniversities the Convocations the Parliaments to betray their Consciences to renounce an Article which they esteem necessary to salvation onely for the feare of a Premunire or the losse of their goods to forswear themselves to deny the Essence of their faith to turn Schismaticks as if they did all value their Goods more then their soules without so much as one to oppose it is a vain uncharitable
Secondly I proved it by one of the Principall Statutes themselves those terms of Law which declare old Law are not the same with those which enact new Law This proofe is demonstrative He urgeth if there were something new it was new and a Statute we Englishmen use to term a Law So if he new turn his Coat there is something new yet we English men say his Coat is and old Coat for all that Magna Charta or the great Charter of England is an old Law yet it hath been renewed or newly declared by almost every succeeding King New Statutes may declare old Lawes He saith I cite two Protestants Fitz-Herbert and my Lord Cooke both of mine owne party to speake in behalf of Protestants I cite no Protestants as Protestants nor to speak for Protestants nor as witnesses in any case in difference between Protestants and Papists but I cite two great English Iudges as Iudges to speak to the Difference between a Declarative Statute and an Enactive Statute by the Law of England and who could be so proper witnesses of the Law of England as they Secondly who told him that Fitzherbert was a Protestant No more a Protestant then himself for any thing that ever I could perceive He was a great Iudge lived in Henry the eighths time and writ sundry workes Where he setteth down the Charge against a Papist he doth it in such a manner that it can hurt no man except he will confesse himself to have done what he did obstinately and maliciously but where he setteth down the charge of a Iustice of Peace against Hereticks or Lollards he giveth it home But Mr. Serjeant hath the art to make Protestants or Papists of whom he list so it serve his present turn Thirdly though Fitzherbert and my Lord Cooke had said nothing yet the case is as cleare as the light that this very Statute is Declarative of old Fundamentall Law not Enactive of new Law And this I prove first by view of the Statute it self He that hath but half an eye in his head may easily discern the difference between an Enactive Statute and a declarative Satute An Enactive Statute looketh onely forward to the time to come and medleth not at all with the time past but a declarative law looketh both wayes backwards and forwards forward to the time to come and backward to the time past Again the very from and tenour of the words is not the same in an Enactive Statute and in a Declarative Statute An Enactive Statute regardeth onely what shall be but a Declarative regardeth what is and what hath been an Enactive Statute createth new Law by the authority of the present Lawgiver a Declarative Statute cōfirmeth old Law and is commonly grounded upon the Fundamentall Constitution of the Kingdome Now then let us take a view of this very Law By divers old authētick histories and Chronicles it is manifestly declared that this realm of England in an Empire and so hath been accepted in the world governed by one supreme head and King c. unto whom a body Politick compact of all sorts and degrees of people divided by names of Spiritualty and Temporalty owe next to God a naturall obedience he being instituted by the goodnesse of God with plenary power to render finall justice for all matters You see plainly that this Statute looketh both wayes forward and backward and doth not onely create new Law but also declare what hath been what is and what ought to be the perpetuall Law of England By diverse old authentick Histories and Chronicles it is manifestly declared c. then it is manifest that this is a declarative Law He saith I quote the Schismaticall King himself and the Schismaticall Parliament to speake in their own behalf By his leave he is mistaken I ground not my reason upon the Authority of the King and Parliament but upon the form or tenour of the Statute whether these words doe contain the form of an Enactive Statute or a Declarative Statute Secondly if I did so yet he hath no reason to complain of it who maketh the Pope and his Councell to be the last Iudge in his own case Thirdly I shall be bold to scrue up this pin a note higher and tell him that if Henry the eight did make himself the last Iudge in those differences between him and the Papacy which concerned the Church and Kingdome of England he did no more then many other Christian Kings and Princes have done before him as I have shewed in the Empire Spain Italy Brabant c. Fourthly if that which was decreed in this Law was decreed in former Lawes standing in full force and unrepealed then it is not Enactive of new Law but Declarative of old Law but I have produced him the Lawes themselves wherein the self same things have been decreed and he turneth his back upon them and referreth us to the Canonists for an answer Lastly it is so far from being true that those Statutes made by Henry the eighth were new Lawes tha◠those ancient Statutes of Clarendon of Carlile the Articles of the Clergy the Statutes of Provisors were no new Lawes when they were made but new declarations of the Fundamētall Lawes of England or of the Originall Constitution of the English Empire as appeareth undeniably by the Statutes of Clarendon the Statute of Carlile and the Statutes of Provisors wherein the same truth is affirmed as positively as I can do it But now Reader wilt thou see a convincing proofe of the extreme carelesnesse and unconscionable oscitance of this great Champion who writeth his answers at Randome and never so much as readeth what is objected against him I cited two Statutes the one of 24. Hen. 8. cap. 12. the other of 16 Ric. 2. cap. 5. The Printer citeth them right i◠the margent but a little confusedly but when Mr. Serjeant commeth to answer them he confoundeth them indeed attributing Richard the seconds Statute to Henry the eighth And lest any man should excuse him and say it was the fault of the Printer heare him he alledgeth another Statute made in the 24. of Henry the 8 Yes well guessed otherwise called the 16. of Richard the second And a little after what maters it what this Statute sayes being made two yeares after his unlawfull marriage with Anna Bullen I know not where he learned this except it was from the old Puppet player who would have Queen Dido to be Richard the thirds Mistresse he might perchance have such another odde Fancy that Richard the second was Anne Bullens Servant That which I observe in earnest is this that he answereth at Random to he knoweth not what and never peruseth that which is objected against him If it had been some rare piece that was cited that he could not have come by it it had bene the more pardonable but it is an English Statute which he might have found in every Bookebinders Shop in every Lawiers Study in every Iustice
truth of what I said take the very words of two Canons of that Councell But if a Clerk have a cause against his own Bishop or against another Bishop let him be Iudged by the Synod of the Province but if a Bishop or a Clerke have a Complaint against the Metropolitan of the same Province let him repaire either to the Primate of the Diocesse or the See of their royall City of Constantinople aend let him be judged there Wee see every Primate that is to say every Patriarch in generall in his own Diocesse or Patriarchate and the Patriarch of Constantinople in particular out of his own Diocesse is equalled by the Councell of Chalcedon to the Bishop of Rome The same in effect is decreed in the seventeenth Canon that if there shall happen any Difference concerning the Possessions of the Churches it shall be lawfull to them who affirm themselves to be grieved to sue before the Holy Synod of the Province but if any man be grieved by his Metropolitan let him be judged by the Primate of the Diocesse or by the holy See of Constantinople I have read those silly Evasions which your greatest Schollars are forced to make use of for answers to these downright Canons Sometimes by Primate of the Diocesse which signifieth all Patriarchs they understand and the Pope Do men use such improper expressions which no man can understand in penning of Lawes Is it not a great Condiscension for the Visible Monarch of all Christendome to stoupe to so meane a Title as the Primate of one single Diocesse But alas it will do him no good For if it were taken in this sense it were the most uniust Canon in the world to deprive all Patriarchs of their Patriarchall Iurisdiction except the Patriarch of Rome and Constantinople The Councell which is so carefull to preserve the Bishop his right and the Metropolitan his right could not be so carelesse to destroy Patriarchall right or the Patriarchs themselves who were present at the making of this Canon so stupid to joine in it At other times they tell us that this is to be understood onely of the first Instance not of Appeales This is weaker and weaker What hath a Metropolitan to doe with private causes of the first instance out of his own Bishoprick What have the Patriarchs of Rome and Constantinople to doe to Iudge causes of the first Instance in other Patriarchates The case is cleare if any man be grieved by his Bishop he may appeale to his Metropolitan and a Synod and if any man be grieved by his Metropolitan he may appeale to his Patriarch And if this absurd sēse which they Imagin were true yet the Bishop of Constantinople might receive Appeales from all parts of the world as well as the Bishop of Rome Let them winde and wrest and turn things as they can they shall never be able to reconcile the Papall Pretensions with the Councell of Chalcedon I have neither changed my mind nor my note concerning Eleutherius his Letter to King Lucius I did I doe esteem it to be of dubious Faith So much I intimated if it be not counterfeit So much he intimated as much as we have Records in our Histories Is it necessary with him to inculcate the same doubt over and over so often as we may take occasion Thus far then we are of accord but in the rest we differ wholy He is positive as much as we have Records the Popes Authority doth appeare I am as positive as much as we have Records the Kings Authority doth appeare For if those Records be true Eleutherius left the Legislative part to King Lucius and his Bishops This was enough to answer him He addeth though our Faith relieth on immediate Tradition for its certain Rule and not upon Fragments of old Authors that is in plain English upon his bare word without any Authority How should a man prove ancient Tradition but by Authors Yet after all this flourish he produceth us not one old Author but St. Prosper a stranger to our affaires and him to no purpose◠who saith onely what he heard in Italy That Pope Celestine sent St. German in his own stead to free the Britons from Pelaginisme and converted the Scots by Palladius If all this were as true as Gospell it signifieth just nothing I have shewed formerly that there is no Act of Iurisdiction in it but onely of the Key of Knowledge He rejoineth that he relied on these words vice sua in his own stead which sheweth that it belonged to his Office to doe it Why should it not The Key of Order belongeth to a Bishop as well as the Key of Iurisdiction And more especially to the Bishop of an Apostolicall Church as Pope Celestine was and in such a case as that was the Pelagian Controversy to testify the Apostolicall Tradition he was bound by his Office to doe it and he trusted S. German to doe it in his place All this is nothing to the purpose there is no Act of Iurisdiction in the Case but of Charity and Devotion Yet if it were not altogether impertinēt to the purpose we have in hand I should shew him that there is ten times better ground to believe that it was done by a French Synod then by Pope Celestine not out of an obscure Author but out of Authentick undoubted Histories as Constātius in the Life of S. German Venerable Bede Mathew Westminster and many others Is it not strange that they being so much provoked are not able to produce a proofe of one Papall Act of Iurisdiction done in Britain for the first six hundred years Here he catcheth hold at a saying of mine which he understandeth no more then the Man in the Moone that all other rights of Iurisdiction doe follow the right of Ordination which he taketh as though I meant to make Ordination it self to be an Act of Iurisdiction though I deny it and distinguish it from it To make the Reader to understand it we must distinguish between actuall Ordination and a right to ordaine Actuall Ordination where there was no precedent Obligation for that person to be ordeined by that Bishop doth imply no Iurisdiction at all but if there was a precedent right in the Ordeiner to ordein that man and a precedent Obligation in the person Ordeined to be ordeined by that Bishop then it doth imply all manner of Iurisdiction suitable to the Quality of the Ordeiner as if he were a Patriarch all Patriarchall Iurisdiction if he were a Metropolitan all Metropoliticall Iurisdiction if he were a Bishop all Episcopall Iurisdiction And the Inference holdeth likewise on the Contrary side that where there is no right precedent to Ordein nor Obligation to be ordeined there is no Iurisdiction followeth but I shewed out of our own Histories and out of the Roman Registers so far as they are set down by Platina that the Bishop of Rome had no right to ordein our British Primates but that they
Subjection at all to another Church They all agree in this the Britons were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all waies ordained at home independent upon any forrain Prelate ought no subjection to Rome And there fore it is no great wonder if Pope Gregory did not know when he was the favourite both of the Pope and people not long before his own promotion to the Papacy whether the Ilanders of Britain were Pagans or Christians To the same purpose speaketh Nicolas Trevet who having commended this Dinoth for a learned and a prudent man he addeth that Austin meeting him did demand that they should performe subjection to him as a Legate sent into this Land by the Pope and Court of Rome and demanded further that he would help him in preaching but he denied the one and the other Still Subjection is denied With these Baleus writing of Dinoth and the life of Austin in Sr. Henry Spellman and all our Antiquaries doe agree exactly And none of our Historiographers that I know doe disagree from it in the least who write upon that subject though some set it down more fully then others Iudge now Reader of Mr. Serjeants Knowledge or Ingenuity who telleth the so Confidently that the right of Subjection never came into play and when I said the British Clergy did renounce all obedieÌ„ce to the Bishop of Rome citing Bede and all others telleth me so confidently that I belied Bede and all our Historiographers at once I challenge him to name but one Historiographer who affirmeth the contrary to that which all these doe affirm if he be not able as he is not I might safely say without asking him leave that it striketh the Question dead His third Exception that it appeareth not that Sr. Henry Spellman found any other Antiquity in that Welsh Manuscript worth mentioning is so dull and unsignificant a piece that I will neither trouble myself nor the Reader with it And such like are his other Obâ—ections which helpresseth not but toucheth gently the Heads of them will not merit a repetition having been answered already by Doctor Hammond But when he is baffeld in the cause he hath a Reserve that Venerable Bede and Gildas and Fox in his Acts and Monuments do brand the Britons for wicked men making them as good as Atheists Of which Gang if this Dinoth were one he will neither wish the Pope such Friends nor envy them to the Protestants What needed this when he hath got the worst of the cause to revenge himself like a Pinece with a stinke We read no other Character of Dinoth but as of a pious learned and prudent man If Gildas or Bede have spoken any thing to the prejudice of the Britons it was not intended against the whole Nation but against particular persons There were St. Davids St. Dubricius's St. Thelaâ—s's St. Oudoceus's and Dinoths as well as such persons as are intended by Gildas or Beda What have they said more of the Britons then God himself and his Prophets have spoken of his own people or more then the Saxons have said one of another or more then maybe retorted upon any NatioÌ„ in Europe Have Gildas or Beda said more of the Birions theÌ„ St. Bernard and others have said of the Irish and yet Ireland was deservedly called the Island of Saints The Question is whether the British Church did ever acknowledge any Subjection to the Bishop of Rome Let him adorn this Sparta and leave other impertinencies Sect. V. That the King and Church of England had sufficient Authority to withdrawe their obedience from Rome The sixth Chapter of my Vindication comprehended my fourth ground consisting of these three particulars That the King and Church of England had sufficient Authority to reform the Church of England That they had sufficient Grounds for doing it And that they did it with due moderation His Rejoinder to this my fourth ground is divided into three SectioÌ„s whereof this is the first Whatsoever he prateth in this Section of my shuffing away the whole Question by balking the Bishop of Romes divine right to his Soveraignty of power to treat of his Patriarchall right which is humane is first vain For I alwayes was and still am ready to joine Issne with him concerning the Bishop of Romes divine right to a Monarchicall power in the Church saving alwaies to myself and my cause this advantage That a Monarchy and a Patriarchate of the same person in the same Body Ecclesiasticall are inconsistent And this right being saved I shall more willingly join issue with him about the Popes Monarchy then about his Patriarchate Secondly as it is vaine so it is altogether impertinent for my Ground is this that a Soveraign Prince hath power within his own Dominions for the publick good to change any thing in the externall Regiment of the Church which is not of divine Institution but the Popes pretended Patronage of the English Church and his Legislative Iudiciary and dispensative power in the exteriour Courtes of the same Church doe concern the externall Regiment of the Church aud are not of divine Institution Here the Hindge of our Controversy doth move without encombring our selves at all with Patriarchall Authority Thirdly I say that this discourse is not onely vaine and extravagant but is likewise false The Popes Protopatriarchall power and the Authority of a Bishop of an Apostolicall Church as the keper of Apostolicall Traditions deposited in that Church are the fairest flowers in his Garland Whatsoever power he pretendeth to over the whole Church of Christ above a Primacy of Order is altogether of humane right and the Application of that Primacy to the Bishop of Rome is altogether of humane right And whatsoever he presumeth of the Vniversall Tradition of the Christian Church or the Notion which the former and present world and we our selves before the Reformation had of the Papacy that is of the Divine right of the Popes Soveraignty is but a bold ratling groundlesse bragge I did and doe affirm that the Pope hath quitted his Patriarchichall power above a thousand yeers since not explicitly by making a formall Resignation of it but implicitly by assuming to himself a power which is inconsistent with it I was contented to forbeare further disputing about Patriarchall rights upon two Conditions one that he should not presume that the Pope is a Spirituall Monarch without proving it The other that he should not attempt to make Patriarchall Privileges to be Royall Prerogatives This by one of his peculiar Idiotisms he calleth Bribing of me If he had had so much Civility in him he might rather have interpreted it a gentle forewarning of him of two Errours which I was sure he would Commit After all his Bravadoes all that he hath pretended to prove is but a Headship a First Movership a Chief Governourship about which we have no Difference with them and all the proofe he bringeth even of that is a bold presumption that there
receive Tenths and First fruits and Oaths of Fidelity and concerning the Supreme Legislative Dispensative and Iudiciary power in all things perteining to the Externall Regimeut of the Church To all this neither the Bishop of Chalcedon nor Mr. Serjeant either in his former Answer or in this rejoinder although provoked have offered one word of Answer This Plea doth utterly destroy their pretense of Divine right and of uninterrupted Tradition for all these Branches of Papall power Can any man be so stupid as to Imagin that to be of divine right which was first tacked into the Church with so much Opposition after eleven hundred yeares or that to be grounded upon perpetuall and Vniversall Tradition which hath been opposed in all Ages since it was devised in all places by all sorts of persons Kings and their Parliaments and Councells Synods and Vniversities Divines and Lawiers What shamefull Tergiversation is this which no ingenious Adversary could be guilty of but out of invincible necessity Thus he served me where I produced all our old English Lawes Thus he served me where I produced their own Authours to testify the intolerable extortions and Vsurpatiōs of the Romā Court Thus he serveth me here and in place of so many lawes and Proclamations and Placaets and Synodall Acts and Iudgements of Vniversities he shuffleth in so many of his fiddle-faddle Contradictions which are not all worth a deafe Nut. If it were not that I have proceeded so far already and Toto devorato Bove turpe est in Cauda deficere I would not Vouchsafe to answer them but with Contempt Thus he begins Nine or ten self Contradictions in one Section He speaketh modestly if there be one there are nine hundred This word in effect saith he deserves a Comment It hath a Comment wherein his feigned Contradictions were satisfyed before they were hatched by him the more uningenuous person he to take no notice of it He may find it in my reply to the Bishop of Chalcedon cap. 7. s. 2. pa. 243. Other Princes of the Roman Communion have made lawes as well as we to renounce and abrogate all those branches of Papall Authority which we cast out that is onely Papall Vsurpations but neither they nor we ever defined against Essentiall right We deny not to the Pope a Superiority of Order above the Archbishop of Canterbury but we deny him a Superiority of power in the Exteriour Court that is we deny him the supreme Iudiciary Power so did they King Henry the eighth abolished the Iurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome within his Dominions but the Emperours did not so If they did not so yet if they pleaded for it or justified it it is as much as I said And if they did it by parcells as I have shewed they did though they did it not in grosse it is the same thing in effect Our Ancestours threatned the Pope to make a wall of Separation between him and them not by making a new Law for it was the Common Law of England but by declaring the Law by executing the Law And though they had threatned him to make one generall Law against all his Vsurpations in grosse yet formerly having made single Lawes against the same in particular it was but the same in effect This sucking Contradiction hath been answered sufficiently in the last Section He saith our Controversy is not about the extent of Papall Power but about the right it self The just Contrary is true Our Controversy is onely about the extent of Papall Power or about those particular Branches of Papall power which we have cast out He loves to hover in Generalls but we shall bring him willingly or against his will to descend to particulars He taketh notice here of my complaining that they answer not particulars and I assure the Reader that if their cause would have born it they would have answered them Observe but how tame he is upon this Provocation that useth to be so fierce without any Provocation All the Answer it doth extort from him is Was ever man so ignorant of the common Lawes of Disputing Needs any more answer to be given to particulars which one yields to then to say he grants them If he be over much acquainted with the Lawes of disputing Reddat mihi Minam Diogenes Let him who tanght me Logick give me my Money again But it is well we have his Concedo omnia c We grant all his particular Instances of these Contests between Kings and Popes Yet not so very well neither for what he granteth with one hand he taketh away with the other Not entring into that dispute how farre they were done Iustly how farre unjustly which is little to our purpose since the Authority it self is acknowledged on both Sides It is little to their purpose indeed but it is much to ours Is the Papall Power acknowledged where the Popes Soveraign Power his Legisllative power his Iudiciary Power his dispensative power are all opposed Much good may his dry Papacy as he pleaseth to call it sometimes do him In every one of these Instances besides meer matter of Fact there is an Inference to matter of right The Common Lawes of Disputing require that he should have answered that as well as granted the other If his Dispatches be such as this he may dispatch more answers in a day then St. Austin could have made Oppositions in a yeare When I said what is the Ground of his Exception Nothing but a Contradiction he urgeth that I make account a Contradiction is a matter of nothing No but I meant that his vain Objecting of Imaginary Contradictions is a matter of nothing Twenty of them will not amount to one Fleabiting and I shewed him that this ridiculous Contradiction which he bringeth here is such an one The pretended Contradiction is this that their Doctrin concerning the Pope is injurious to Princes and prejudices their Crownes and yet that they hold and doe the same in effect against the Pope that Protestants doe A doughty Contradiction both parts are as true as can be referendo singula singulis referring what I said to the right Subject as I applied it The Doctrin of the Pope and Court of Rome is injurious to Princes of whom I speake expresly and no others and yet soveraign Princes and their Councells have held and done the same things against the Pope in effect that Protestants doe Iust such another Contradiction as this The Guelphes are for the Pope against the Emperour yet the Gibellines are for the Emperour against the Pope and both Factions Roman Catholicks Thus he changeth Subjects and Predicates and times and respects and all Rules to make a Contradiction But his defence is more ridiculous then his pretended Contradiction That the substance of the Popes Authority is the point which belongs to me to impugn So the Contradiction lieth not in what I did say but what I should have said or rather what he would have had me to have said
His Friend Possivine calls him a Virulent Adversary and if ever Mr. Serjeant read him throughly it is ten to one he will change his note Thus much for my Communion with the Eastern Churches it is the same with the Southern and Northern Churches all which doe plead better Tradition then himself Whereas he saith that my Assertion that the Creed conteined all points necessary to be believed is grounded onely upon my falsifying of the Councell of Ephesus he bewrayeth his ignorance both in the Fathers and in his own Authours The Scripture is none of those particular Articles which are necessary to Salvation to be believed but it is the Evidence whereby those Articles are revealed and wherein they are comprehended The Creed was composed before the Canon of Scripture was perfected They have not onely changed from their Ancestours in Opinions but they have changed their own Opinions into necessary Articles of Faith which is worse I denied that the Councell of Trent was a Generall Councell as wanting the requisite Conditions of a Generall Councell which they themselves judge to be necessary The summons ought to have been generall but it was not The great Patriarchs ought to have been present but they were not neither the Patriarchs of Constantinople Alexandria Antioch and Hierusalem nor any of them nor yet the Patriarchs of Armenia Abissina Mosco Mussall c. nor any of them He answereth they had no right to be summoned thither unlesse to be called to the Barre as Delinquents nor to sit there nor are to be accounted Christians It had need to be a large Barre indeed to hold them all Was it ever heard before that a fifth part of a Councell did call foure parts to the Barre Their Ancestours had right to be summoned to a Generall Councell and to sit and vote there as well as the best how have their posterity lost this right Had they been heard and condemned in a Generall Councell No. But he urgeth what need hearing when themselves in the Face of the whole world publickly confessed and maintaine their imputed fault How what needed hearing O Iust Iudge He that giveth a right Sentence yet if he give it without hearing is an unrighteous Iudge They confessed their imputed Fault but did they confesse it to be a Fault No I warrant you he can not say it for shame Or how should they confesse it in the Face of the whole Christian world They are the Christian world themselves and your Roman world is but a Microcosme in comparison of them The case is so evident and notorious that no man can doubt of it The Continent hath not left St. Peters Boat but St. Peters Boat hath left the Continent The Innovation or swerving from Apostolicall Tradition was not in the Christian world but in the Court of Rome who would have advanced their Aristocraticall power to a Soveraign Monarchicall power but the Christian world would not give way to it if this were an errour in them all their Ancestours were guilty of it as well as they But the Court of Rome being conscious to themselves that they were the Innovators to free themselves from feare of being censured by the Christian World adventured to give the first blow by censuring the whole Christian world it self This was a Bolder Act then that of Pope Victor which Irenaeus misliked so much He will never leave his Socraticall manner of disputing by Questions what certain Rule have we to know what Sects are of she Church Although I needed not yet I have answered this demand formerly All those are of the Church who weare the Badge and Cognisance of Christians that is the Apostles Creed as it is explicated by the foure first Generall Councells as all those Churches doe and have not been cast out of the Church by the Sentence of a Generall Councell as none of these Churches have no nor yet by the Sentence of the Roman Church it self if we may trust the Bishop of Chalcedons Survey cap. 8. Neither doth the Roman Church excommunicate all the Christians of Affrick Asia Greece and Russia but onely such as doe vincibly or sinfully erre He addeth that there are innumerable who are not formall Hereticks but onely Hereticis Credentes These continue good Christians still and are Churches still and ought not to be excluded froÌ„ Generall Councells though supposed to be materially in an errour much lesse being innocent and in no Heresy or Schisme either formall or Materiall I pleaded that though it were true that all the other Patriarchs were such Materiall Hereticks yet of all others they ought especially to have been summoned The reason is evident because they that are sick have more need of the Physitian then they that are in health Hence he inferreth that it is more necessary that Hereticks be called to a Generall Councell then Orthodox Fathers Not so both are necessary the one to Cure the other to be cured but the especiall Consideration or end of a Councell is for those that erre that they may be reduced I said the Pope hath not that Authority over a Generall Councell that the King hath over a Parliament He answereth that he is so plaine a man that he understandeth not what the Authority of King or Parliament signifies I will help him The King may dissolve a Parliament when he pleaseth so may not the Pope a Generall Councell against their wills If the King dye by whose writ it was called the Parliament is dissolved so is not a Generall Councell by death of the Pope The King hath a Negative voice in Parliament so hath not the Pope in a Generall Councell I urged that the Protoâ—patriarchs are not known or condemned Rebells He answereth first this is onely said againe not proved He is alwaies stumbling upon the same Block It doth not belong to me to prove they were not condemned but to himself who accuseth them to shew when and where they where condemned Secondly he answereth that their Errours have been condemned by Councells and for the most part some of their own party being present But the condemning of their errours is no sufficient warrant for the excluding of their persons out of Generall Councells Neither were these Councells Generall Councells or such as had any Iurisdiction over the Protopatriarchs Moreover they condemne Papall Errours as well as he condemneth their Errours whether is more Credit to begiven to the Pope in his own cause charging all the Patriarchs in the world or to all the other Patriarchs in the world unanimously condemning his Vsurpations in the name of the Catholick Church He demands whether there might not be a Parliament of England without having the fifth part of the Members found in that Councell and yet be a lawfull Parliament I think there might if the absence of all the rest proceeded from their own neglect but not if it proceeded from want of Summons as the absence of the Protopatriarchs did He bids me rub up my memory he believes
I will find an English Law that sixty Members is a sufficient number to make a lawfull Parliament I have done his Commands and I know no such law nor he neither and then he must be a very confident man to cite such a Law Perhaps he hath heard of some Ordinance of the House of Commons how many members at the least must be present at doing of some inferiour Acts but neither is this Ordinance an English Law â—or that House an English Parliament He saith I excepted against the superproportioned multitude of Members out of one Province which never lawfull Parliament had Superproportioned indeed where there were double the Number of Italian Bishops to all the other Bishops of the Christian world this is no equall representative and these assembled thither not to dispute as he fancieth vainly but meerly to overvote the Tramontanes A few Bishops had sufficed to relate the Beliefe or Tradition of Italy as well as the rest of the world but that had not sufficed to doe the Popes worke that was to overswey the rest of the Christian world with his Superproportioned multitude of Italian Bishops He saith perhaps I will pretend that had the Catholick Bishops out of their Provinces been there they would have voted against their Fellow Catholicks in behalf of Luther and Calvin which were a wise answer I heed not much what he calleth wise or foolish I doe not onely pretend but I see clearly that If the Bishops of other Countries had been proportioned to those of Italy they had carried the Debate about Residence and the Divine right of Episcopacy and that had done the bâ—sinesse of the Western Church and undone the Court of Rome But he quite omitteth the most materiall part of my Discourse concerning his resemblance between a Parliament and a Generall Councell That the absence of whole Provinces and the much greater part of the Provinces either of England or of Christendome for want of due Summons doth disable such a Parliament or such a Councell from being a Generall Representative of the whole He might even as well say that an Assembly of the Peers and Burgesses of Wales upon Summons without any appearance or summons of all the rest of the Kingdome of England was a lawfull Parliament of all England as say the Councell of Trent was a Generall Representative of the Christian world which was never summoned I proved that the Councell of Trent was no Generall Councell because it was not Generally received no not among the Occidentall Churches particularly by the Church of France in point of Discipline He answereth that notwithstanding They acknowledge it to be a lawfull Generall Councell and receive it in all Determinations belonging to Faith Adding that the Disciplinarian Lawes of a Generall Councell doe bind particular Countries onely in due Circumstances and according to their Conveniences But the Contrary is most apparent that Councells truly Generall being the Supreme Tribunalls of the Catholick Church doe bind particular Churches as well in point of Discipline as of Faith The Generall Councells of Constantinople and Chalcedon did set the See of Constantinople before AlexaÌ„dria and Antioch And equall it to Rome notwithstanding the Popes Opposition What OpinioÌ„ the King and Church of France had of the Councell of Trent in those Dayes appeareth by the solemne Protestation of the French Ambassadour made in the Councell in the name of his Master and the French Church that seeing all things were done at Rome rather then at Trent and the decrees there published were rather the decres of Pius the fourth then of the Councell of Trent We denounce said he and protest before you all that whatsoever things are decreed and published in this Assembly by the mere will and pleasure of Pope Pius neither the most Christian King will ever approve nor the French Church ever acknowledge to be the decrees of a Generall Councell That the Councell of Trent was not a free Councell I proved first by the Testimony of Sleidan secondly by the bitter complaint of the Fathers in the Councell of Trent that it was guided by the Spirit sent from Rome in a Male thirdly by the Popes creating â—ot onely new Bishops but new Bishopricks in the time of the Councell to make his party able to overvote their Opposers To the first he saith that Sleidan was a notorious lying Authonr of our own side Who fitter to relate the Grievances of the Protestants then a Protestant which he did not say in a Corner but published to the world in print when they might have refuted it if they could To the second he answereth that it was a jeering expression Yes it was biting as well as jeering Ridiculum acri Fortius melius magnas plerumque secat res The French Ambassador whom he thought to passe by in silence did not jeere yet he said the same thing in sad earnest To my third Argument he saith â—t is nothing to the purpose How nothing to the purpose for the Pope when his affaires were going retrograde and his party like to be overvoted to create new Bishopricks to ordaine new Bishops and pack them away presently to the Councell to assist his party and by that means to gaine a plurality of Voices Is this nothing to the purpose in his Opinion It may be he thinkes that Italy had not Bishops enough there yet they had two thirds of the Councell before or that these new Bishops did understand the Tradition and Beliefe of Italy better then all the rest If it be his mind to wave the Popes Patriarchall power I am contented otherwise his proofe will not weigh much unlesse we admit strangers who know little or nothing of our Privileges more then we know the Cyprian Privilege before the Councell of Ephesus to be competeÌ„t judges and will interpret a Western Patriarch to be the onely Patriarch of all the west The Archbishop of Yorke is Primate of EnglaÌ„d and yet all England is not subject to his Iurisdiction Forfeiture and Quitting are two distinct Charges an Office is Forfeited by abuse and quitted by assuming a new Office inconsistent with the former as I have shewed the Papacy and a Patriarchate that is a Soveraign and Subordinate power to be But a Patriarchate and a Bishoprick being both subordinate to a Generall Councell are not inconsistent and much lesse the Office of a King and Master of a Family the one being Politicall the other Oeconomicall But an Vniversall Monarchy by divine right and the Presidency of a Particular Province by Humane right are inconsistent I gave him my reasons for it and he taketh no notice of them He excepteth against my styling Patriarchall Authority a Patriarchall Aristocraticall dignity which he calleth my thrice repeated non sense It is well he did not make it a Contradiction His reason is because a Patriarchaâ—e is a Government by one an Aristocracy by many The answer is Obvious and easy a Patriarch is a Monarch in the Government