their Remonstrances then such a forced Compliance might have been censurable for Cowardice but here being nothing of this but a calm and constant quiet under the Procedures of the State it must be resolved that the Sence of the Convocation judged it allowable Dyscher But if the Church shall yield without any Remonstrance to such Intrusions of Civil Powers upon the Churches Liberties Censures and Authorities then for Cause or no Cause we shall be liable to Suspensions and Deprivations according to the Tydes of Humour and Temper in our Legislatours and thus fall under the Arbitrary Disposals which the High-Priesthood of the Jews suffered under Heathen and the Greek Patriarchals now suffers under Mahumetan Princes a Blemish not to be endured by any Church whatsoever it incurs for the Opposition Eucher You may remember that I have yielded to you that the Consent Publick and Actual Concurrence of the Church is necessary to give an Ecclesiastical Effect to Civil Ordinances in Matters of the Church And so here the Church is to Judge whether she may or must in Duty concurr or no and hence a Right essentially belongs to it to examine all the Causes of the Secular Demands So that if she finds there are no Grave Reasons to move the Church to the required Severities she ought to disobey as my Lord Bishop of London well did when required to Suspend Dr. Sharp indictâ causâ Nay so he ought to have done had the King been de jure Arbitrary and of Despotick Power Thus if a Prince shall trifle and require a Bishop to Hawk Hunt play at Tables run Races c. up on pain of Deprivation though none of these things be simply Unlawful for Men in General or for a Bishop to avoid a Persecution yet upon neglect of such injoyned Follies no Man will judge a Deprivation Just nor the neglect a Sin nor ought the Church to admit Deprivations on such improper and unreasonable Demands Thus †Naz. in Epitaph Patr. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gregory Nazianzen the Father in the behalf of the Church of Cappadocia tells Julian That they will stand by the Bishop they had set in the Church of Cesarea whatsoever Law or Violence he should offer to the contrary And I will grant you that the Church hath this Right against the Violence of Christian as well as Heathen Princes since 't is the quality of the Cause not the Prince upon which the Church is to Act Else under the Name of Christian many Un-Christian Pranks may be obtruded on the Church to the Reproach and Ruine of Christianity And whether the Church yields to or opposes the Laws of the State justly or unjustly must not be judged alone from the Rights of Civil Sovereignty but upon the Reasons of the Subject Matter in which the Concurrence of the Church is required And in our Case the Church judges it Lawful and Rational for her to admit the present Law of Deprivation from the Weight and Reasons thereof against the present Recusancy And our Judgment herein hath greater Foundation than those Concurrences and Acts of the Church in the High Commissions Ecclesiastical had heretofore in the Suspensions Deprivations in several Reigns of Reformed Princes that were purely the Executions of a Royal Authority delegated to the Judges upon little many times and captious Exceptions relating sometimes to Civils sometimes to Ecclesiasticals Dyscher But here the chief Delegates pronouncing Ecclesiastical Censures were generally Bishops tho' the Assessours were several of them Lay Personages without whose Vote or Privity nothing was to be done And this with good Reason the Causes censurable being many times mixt and so likewise the Judgments that is partly of Civil partly of Ecclesiastical Importance But tho' the King's Commission did give them License as to Place Matter Form and time of Proceeding yet the Ecclesiastical Censures had their Ecclesiastical Virtue from the Ecclesiastical Authority of the Ecclesiastical Delegates pronouncing them as in the Censures of Excommunication is most Evident this being plainly not of Regal but Apostolick Authority and the Power of the Keys which none of our Reformed Princes would assume to themselves or delegate to mere Lay-Judges Eucher But what think you of the Deprivation past on the Bishops c. Recusant to the Royal Supremacy of Queen Elizabeth by Vertue of an Act of Parliament which by their Lay Power did overbear the Episcopal and upon whose Order herein standeth our Ecclesiastical Succession from those Bishops that succeeded in the room of the Deprived Dyscher You must note that these Recusants were guilty of the false Doctrine of the Papal against the Regal Supremacy Which false Doctrine had been before Synodically condemned in the Reign of H. VIII and so effectually stood tho' Q. Mary martyred deprived and exiled both the Orthodox Bishops and Clergy for this really as well as for other Orthodoxies Therefore those deprived by Q. Eliz. were either Apostate from the Doctrine they had before professed in entrance into their Stations and so were ipso facto irregular and to be de jure Canonico deserted of all or else they came into the rooms of Men unjustly deprived and so were Usurpers or into Places really vacant which for not owning by Oath and Doctrine the Regal Supremacy they were not capable of by the still unrepealed Canons of the Church and so were in truth not true Bishops nor Ministers of the Places they assumed Well therefore might they deprive them of the Bishopricks c. that were in no Canonical Title the true Proprietors But here ours deprived were all true Proprietors under no Irregularity through Apostasie false Doctrine or uncanonical Deficiencies Eucher You frame new Notions now not started nor conceived then For upon your Plea they should never have sate in that Parliament nor have been owned as Bishops before that Act past but yet so they were in all their Titles And in the Disputation at Westminster in the beginning of the Queens Reign the five Popish Bishops were owned with all their Titles by the Lords of the Queen 's Privy Council and by the Protestant Disputants themselves Even as Hooper also owns them for such and the whole Popish Convocation for such in his Epistle that he wrote to it in the days of Q. Mary And in that Station they had continued upon their former Installations except only such who had offended or usurped the Places of Men yet in being and expecting restitution if they would have taken the Oath of Supremacy Here therefore the State enacts and Ecclesiastical Deprivation and it is all one whether you will say on a Civil or Ecclesiastical Point if on a Civil then the Case is the same with ours if Ecclesiastical also then that Parliament entred more upon Ecclesiastical Matters and Authorities than this hath done and yet you condemn not that Parliament as Schismatical nor the Church admitting it Apostate Why then charge you this upon our State and Church now Here is no
old nor inferr a Title to a New Bishop which is the Point before us Nor can they justly deny those Externals to the Church though they may to those that offend against her on a just presumption of the Churches consent or her express Petition thereunto And this was the Sence of St. Athanasius when he denied Constantius a Church for Arians in Alexandria and of St. Ambrose when he and his Flock kept their Churches at Milan against the Commands and Terrours of the Emperour Valentinian Junior on the behalf of the Arians and of St. Chrysostom when he at Constantinople denied the Emperour Arcadius a Church for Gamas his Arian General And even in Places not Consecrated Place Time and Air and Liberty to do good are the Primitive Fundamental and undeniable Rights of the Innocent Else the Christians had sinned in using these for Christian Worship against the Laws Imperial So that as yet you can fix no Spiritual Powers in Secular States that can extinguish a Christian Man's Christian Graces Rights and Orders Eucher But our Lawyers tell us that our Kings are mixt Persons and not mere Laity and so by a joint Act of Sacred and Civil Authority may execute Spiritual Censures as far as their Authority hath a mixture of Spirituals Dyscher The Doctrine of Lawyers is with us no Divinity and St. Ambrose and Theodosius the Emperour had other Sences when the Bishop would not permit the Emperour being of the Laity to come within the Chancel or the Rails of the Altar and the Emperour acknowledged the Prohibition to be properly Just and Episcopal and the Rule Ecclesiastical which he would never more neglect during his Life Eucher But though he is of the Laity yet being Christian by virtue of his Christianity and Civil Sovereignty too he may have Christian joyntly with his Civil Authorities For as Christian he may be reputed as Head and Representative of the whole Christian Laity whom you grant before at Liberty to separate from an offensive Bishop and to procure another from Social Bishops Or if you will not admit him the alone Representative of the Laity then you may take in the Lords and Commons the whole Christian Legislative into that Number or Body of Representatives Dyscher This Notion as specious as it is will not hold for then the King and the Legislative must be professed Members of our Churches Communion but they claim this Right by virtue of the Royalty and Legislative Power though the King be not of our Religious Communion They will stand by all their Acts in or about Ecclesiasticals though contrary to all the Canons of Ecclesiastical Integrity or else I will not give Two-pence for the Act of Toleration And in this Case before us they deprive the Bishops on a pretended Title of the Civil Sovereignty for the just and necessary security thereof and there is the same Reason for Heathen Monarchs to deprive Christian Bishops on the same Pretensions Eucher I am almost weary with struggling and for that Cause will admit that an Act of a State Christian cannot not alone vacate a Spiritual Charge by any Divine Law or Primitive Canon or Prescription yet such an Act received and admitted by the Church may from her concurrence have a just and legal Effect And then upon this Notion the Statute of Deprivation ipso facto must be taken for a Law upon the Church to eject such Recusants totally from their Stations and the other Laws for Conge deslire c. as Commands on the Church to admit those the King Recommends to the Sees which either are or by the State are reputed Vacant And then the concurrence of the Church to these Laws of the State doth actually and upon just Causes rightfully exauctorate those whom the Statute dooms to Deprivation And to say Truth in all Ecclesiasticals 't is the actual Concurrence of the Church that gives the Statutes an Ecclesiastical Effect and Issue and so though the Original of the Deprivation be Secular yet the Form is Ecclesiastical and in this the Essential Vertue thereof lies and is properly Spiritual and Christian Tho' then the Laws require yet the Chapters Bishops Clergy and Laity do thereupon actually reject and deprive one and admit another Bishop c. Dyscher Then neither the Act for Deprivation nor the Writ of Conge deslire do alone vacate the Sees and if not by what Authority can Chapters proceed to Elect and Bishops proceed to Consecrate new ones in the stead of the actual Incumbents Eucher Because under all the Obligations Causes herein the Church ought to empt the Sees of such Incumbents that are dangerous to the Civil State by Acts of Separation properly Ecclesiastical and so it doth the Dean and Chapter of the Metropolitical Church taking the Jurisdiction till the Chapter Elect and Bishops Consecrate another c. Dyscher Who are the proper Judges of this Duty to eject a Bishop at the Command of the State Eucher All Parties pressed thereunto by the Civil Powers with a proper Judgment of Conscience for themselves and the Church tho' not of ordinary Jurisdiction over the Bishop For when two powers contest and require my concurrence I must then judge on which side Justice lies and to which thereupon Duty binds me and to that I must adhere and do my Part to hinder the other Party from opposing that which I am in Duty bound to And when Chapters and Bishops thus acting obtain the consequent Concurrence and Comprobation of the whole Church their Acts have as good an Authority from Humane Consent as the received Docrees of Councils whose Validity stands or falls with the subsequent Sence of the Churches in common Dyscher The silence and yielding of the Churches in common consequent upon the Violences Men admit for fear of Persecution signifies no certain Perswasion or Conviction that the Deprived suffer nothing but Justice If our Cause had been Condemned in your Convocations you had brought a more specious Argument for the Sence and Censure of the Church than this thin Pretence that carries no Colour nor Shadow of Probability Eucher Even here I will endeavour to satisfie you tho' I shall not gratifie you The General Conformity of most Bishops Clergy and Laity our sending a Convocation at Their Majesties Precept shews we own Subjection to them and Condemns the Recusancy as an Errour which of what Consequence it is every Man that thinks it Errour sees And the silence of the Convocations under this Statute of Deprivation argues their Opinion to be that they were in this to yield to the State Dyscher As if this silence was not the result of Fear and Treachery rather than Judgment for this we charge upon Liberius and the Council of Ariminum when their concurrence with the Arians is urged in Defence of Arianism Eucher Had the Convocation first stoutly decried the Statute as Liberius and that Council at first did Arianism and had upon Menaces or Experiences of bodily Persecution retracted
are persecuted by the Church as well as the State But this will require a very clear proof ere we can be justly charged with so great an Impiety Dyscher This Church hath ever Taught us to preserve an untainted Loyalty to our lawful Sovereigns which with us come in by Inheritance and accordingly our Oath of Allegiance binds us to the King his Heirs and Lawful Successors and this Obligation ceaseth not till Death or Resignation dissolves it Neither of which happened in this Revolution Eucher If by Resignation you mean a formal voluntary Act and Deed passing away the Title Royal then I deny that Death only and Resignation vacate our Allegiance for many Publick Authorities are void by mere Cession and Desertion which is indeed in Law equivalent to a Resignation And such a Cession here hapned which the Estates in Convention judged a Virtual Abdication of the Sovereignty and of this being a Point of Law they were to us at that time and in that juncture the most Competent Authentick and Final Judges which we are the more to submit to since the Kingdom hath ratified their Proceedings in a second Parliament And though K. James abroad condemns them yet that is no Argument either that they were unjust or inauthoritative 'T is granted that this Church preaches up an indispensable Loyalty to the Sovereign during the Tenure of his Sovereignty but when a King is fled from his Throne into Foreign Dominions or doth not exert any Royal Power or Presence to his People the Estates of this Land are the Supreme Domestick Judges upon the Tenure of the Sovereignty which is not to make them Judges of the King's Person but in the want of his Person of the State of the Kingdom and the Rights of the Nation in order to Settlement Nor is it a just Exception to deny the Authority by which they sate for by what Authority was that Free Parliament called or sate that voted in King Charles the Second 'T is prodigious Peevishness to require a King's Presence or Commission when he is gone and hath left all in Anarchy In such Confusion howsoever they come together they are the Supremest Council of the Land And yet by the Practice of all Nations and the Reasons of Peace and Settlement the Estates of any Nation being invited by a victorious and unresisted Power may come together and Treat with him that thus calls them tho' he hath no antecedent Authority strictly taken to call them So that the Churches Loyalty is to follow the Civil Judgment concerning the Object of our Loyalty and the Tenure of Sovereignty Dyscher Supposing them then in a state of Confusion proper Judges of the Tenure of Sovereignty which they determined abdicated by K. James yet how could they pervert the Hereditary Law and Rule of Succession that is Fundamental to this Crown Eucher I answer hereunto That the general and ordinary Rule of Succession to this Crown is Hereditary and in this we are very happy against the dangerous Consequences of ambitious Competitions But in extraordinary Interruptions and Convulsions of State against the ordinary Course our Laws and Constitutions do allow the Estates such a King as can actually be had for the time being till the ordinary Rule can be fairly recovered and in this also we are equally Happy if we would but know or see it This in Fact is evident from all the History of our Succession The Heirs Lineal have submitted to it the many Acts of Parliament yet in force made by Extra-lineal Kings and the concurrent Judgment of our greatest Lawyers under Hereditary Kings even since the Reformation without any Remonstrance of this Church or any Hereditary King are an Authentick Demonstration hereof and Bishop Overal's Convocation-Book comes up to it And my Opinion is That in the late Oath of Allegiance the word Successors was added after Heirs on this very self-same ground That tho' Heirs by the ordinary course are the Legal Successors yet others legally may succeed in cases extraordinary for I will not be so bold as to say That the Oath required Allegiance to unlawful Successors And the non-observance hereof hath been the occasion of so many Paradoxes or Absurdities in Discourses upon this Point Dyscher What! Can he be Legal that thrusts out the Legal King or Legal Successor Eucher One King by a Legal War may thrust out him that till he was thrust out was Legal King of his own People For the first offending Prince loses not his Sovereignty to the offended merely by the offence till actually thrust out by the offended And even an unjust Potentate tho' he cannot according to Legal Justice out a King against whom he hath no legal Cause or Right of War yet if he doth do so and the Subject People cannot help it and he enforce himself upon the People for a New King our Laws in this concur with the Laws and Practice of all Nations in allowing our Estates to determine for us in such Exigences as is manifest in the long Contentions and many Turns between the Houses of York and Lancaster and the Sin shall lie only on the Injurious and not on them that submitted to an inevitable Fate of things And yet in our case upon the Cession of K. James the Hereditary Succession was not violently broken but altered by consent of the next Heirs antecedent to the P. of Orange which shews that the two next Heirs judged that their Father had effectually deserted the Crown and were content for the Preservation of the Nation against the Power of France to admit before them a Prince of the Blood whose great Interest abroad and whose personal Abilities of Conduct in Counsels and War might be a Wall of Defence as well to the true Royal Heirs as to the Religion Rights and Liberties of the People Upon all which put together I think we are bound by the old Laws and Oath of Allegiance to the King his Heirs and Successors to pay Allegiance to K. William and Q. Mary and that 't is a breach of those Laws and Oath to deny it them Dyscher But suppose the Violence done to the rejected Prince be in it self essentially unjust and unnatural and contrary to the Moral and Eternal Laws of God and Righteousness can humane Compacts ratifie a wrong and justifie or confirm what is essentially injurious And must even the Priests of the most High God consecrate and confirm such Rapes by Oath and Religious Sponsions Eucher What would you inferr from hence Dyscher Perhaps the deprived Bishops and Clergy considering the Relation Their present Majesties stand in to K. James and the Subjection due from all Natives in this Kingdom as well in as out of Parliament may think this a Breach of the Moral Laws of God and not to be confirmed by their Oath Eucher Then first I answer The Internal Immorality of all Actions must be carefully distinguished from the Civil Consequences of them Now the Iniquity is not to be